Cataclysm
by World of Bubbles
Summary: Throughout the eons, many events have thrown the world back into the throes of Chaos. Only this one, however, is all Rhea's doing. Companion to Defiance.
1. Prologue

_All things truly wicked start from innocence._

_-Ernest Hemingway_

* * *

"Any last words?"

Kronos cracks open his swollen eye, regarding his son with utter contempt.

The Titan's own golden scythe brushes against his neck, sharper than any other substance known to man. Faintly, Kronos wonders how it will cut into his skin. It tore apart Ouranos like butter, as he recalls. To him it is bound to do the same.

With pursed lips he studies Zeus. Kronos had been a fool not to recognize him when he first presented himself on Mount Othrys, for in the light he looks like Kronos from hundreds of years ago – the young immortal who had castrated his own father and thrown the universe asunder.

Yes, the Fates had always told the Titan Lord that one of his progeny were bound to follow in his footsteps. He glances at his other children standing fast behind their new tyrant, somber faces darkened by their time spent in the pit that was their father's belly.

_Craven little bastards_, he muses, _they would not have last a day against merciless Ouranos_.

"Only a few, but not for any of you," Kronos snorts, masking the desire to curl his lips into a snarl, rip the very flesh off his own son's face with sharpened teeth.

He tears his eyes away from Zeus, turning his fury on the uninterested Titaness cowering at the edge of the gathered gods. Perhaps she thought herself unnoticeable but that had never been the case for Kronos, not even in his grandest of moments. He fixated on her always.

"Look at me, Rhea."

Her eyes – alien green and the spitting image of Gaia – snap to attention, narrowing in a way that could kill a thousand creatures with a single stroke. She lowers the hood of her cloak, steeling herself against him.

But the gaze of Kronos is nothing to be taken lately either – not when pain and rage swirl together in pools the color of ichor. He is almost pleased when she flinches.

"I want you to look at what you've done. I want my blood to haunt you throughout the eons."

Perhaps, when they recount the stories that led to this night, they will always mark her as a bystander in the universe's conflicts. But Kronos, even from the depths of Tartarus, will know better.

_All of this was her doing._

Her bottom lip trembles slightly, for only a second. But it is enough for him, to see that knife twist in her gut: the guilt of betrayal. Her face hardens once more and she comes forward to stand beside her youngest son. "May Tartarus welcome you with open arms."

Kronos only smiles. Her words hurt but his words have hurt her too and that is enough for creatures like him.

"Do it now," says a small voice from behind Rhea. A small goddess in a hooded brown robe, blazing eyes like a fire. Sweet Hestia, the eldest of his children. "Let it be done."

Kronos bursts into a fit of laughter just as the scythe lops off his head.

* * *

**A lot of the scenes featured in this short fic are from Defiance, only they've been modified or expanded to fit this standalone story. For anyone just looking to satisfy a Greek mythology itch, no knowledge of the Percy Jackson universe or a read-through of Defiance is required.**


	2. Caged Bird

When her light shines into existence, sprung from the aperture of her mother's womb and given life by beloved and dreaded Chaos, Rhea knows who she is:

The blood of Gaia, Earth-mother, and starry Ouranos the sky-lord. She is as beautiful as her namesake suggests, born with only two legs, two arms, two eyes, and the powers deserving of a Titaness – much to her mother's relief. Rhea, of course, is too young, too new, to know why anything else is such a danger.

But she is quick to learn.

In the days she waddles across the earth – Gaia's hovering hand to guide her – Rhea meets her sire. Ouranos sits amongst the silver clouds, fists clenched, face as blank as stone. He must study all new additions to the world he so meticulously keeps in line and Rhea is no exception.

His eyes are not kind and she knows immediately that he does not care for her.

Gaia does.

"Too much," says her elder sister, Phoebe, when a few years have passed and young Rhea has grown more. She is to be taken away to be raised on Othrys – a mountain so far in the distance Rhea would need to sit upon her father's lap to even catch a glimpse of it.

"Othrys," her mother spits back. "I suppose you control it now with Koios. But, in a decade, you will lose your seat, only for Krios to claim it back. Or Iapetus. Or Hyperion."

She should be doomed to the same fate of warring Titans attempting to reclaim a desolate pile of rock; Ouranos above it all, laughing at such a spectacle.

"She is too gentle for war," Gaia affirms in her boundless wisdom. "I will raise her alone. You have no need of her."

And so Phoebe leaves with empty hands.

And so Rhea stays.

Gaia tells her there is no reason to leave this place. The Earth Mother's nomadic ways have been put to rest – they have everything they need in the plains, she says. Rhea, of course, agrees. She doesn't yet know any better.

Rhea looks out to the blue pond at the center of her territory. She marks the hills towards the west and sea to the east, signifying its limits. Rhea finds herself resigned to it – this is the parcel of land she has been given and the parcel on which she will remain.

Centuries pass and she will refuse to think beyond it. She has no reason to.

* * *

Rhea was born on a midsummer's day, wailing beneath the slaving sun. And beneath the sun she can always be found, lounging on beds of wildflowers. Even her faithful lions distance themselves from their Titaness to find shelter at this time of day, unable to tolerate the heat. The same can be said of any other immortal beings frolicking around the grassy plains, as she is more than sure Hyperion would revel in setting anyone's skin to burn.

But this is her home and the heat is like a blanket, a comfort that even Gaia's womb had never provided.

_Mother._

Rhea bolts upright. She stares at the sky, unable to judge quite how much time has passed. Time here either crawls at a leisurely pace or sprints at breakneck speeds. The air though, she realizes now, is too still for her liking. She can hear not one creature rustle for miles.

Rhea knows what that means.

She runs, a gazelle zipping through the grass. The wind rips through her hair, rocks cut at the soles of her feet. Yet she continues still, never slowing until she can spot her thatched home in the distance.

Rhea hesitates when it comes into view. Unnatural dust clouds swarm about the abode expertly crafted of thorny vines and mudbrick – a hobble compared to the grand fortresses her sisters occupy. The silence weighs heavily on her. Every nerve in her body screams at her to run away.

A crash comes from inside and Rhea dives for the door, throwing it open with a slam. But she goes no farther than that, a god blocking her entrance. A god with ashen skin, dressed in flaming robes and rattling bone armor. His eyes – a molten silver – burn holes in the girl's skull. He is no ordinary god, only hellfire made flesh.

She collapses at his feet. Her wailing drifts towards the merciless heavens unheard. Something in his eyes suggests that he would smile. Otherwise, emotionless, he steps over and sweeps out the door, nothing but a shadow.

Gaia does not take long to find her.

"Rhea, you know not to look at him!" She gathers her in her arms as any mother would but the Primordial's face darkens in a manner unbecoming of such. "But you never do listen, you stupid girl. I told you to stay by the pond."

Rhea's eyes linger on the gray mottled around her mother's neck, suspiciously in the shape of a hand. "He always comes after you fight with father," she musters out through gritted teeth. Her fists clench into Gaia's already tattered skirts. "He leeches onto your pain. Stop opening your legs for him. Stop feeding him."

"Stop questioning me," Gaia sneers all the same as she pulls Rhea to her feet. The girl recoils, arms tucked in tight to her chest.

Gaia's chagrin does not relent. "You're only a baby. What do you know of Chaos, the abyss? Of darkness and loneliness, of tireless work in bringing everything into Creation? You know nothing, girl. Absolutely nothing." She shakes her head and her gaze drifts to the open door. "Neither does your father. He wasn't there either, none of you lot of fools were. But Tartarus was. And so Tartarus will forever remain by my side, whether I want him there or not."

"If you cannot stomach fools cast me aside then," she says boldly and with no consequence. "But we both know you never will."

Two pairs of narrowed green eyes meet each other head-on. Gaia remains silent.

"You do it because you never want to be lonely again," Rhea continues. "Know that I can so easily choose to leave. Know that I can leave you here to rot."

Gaia slaps her hard enough to shake the earth around them. Rhea blinks, feeling her tears welling up but wills them not to fall.

The earth goddess takes a menacing step forward, her final blow yet undelivered. "Little Rhea fancies herself a woman now, does she? Yet I know a baby's words when I hear them. Just what I expect from you. But if you want to go? Go then."

The girl turns on her heels, bolting through the door once more just as her mother shouts, "You're bound to come back! You always do."

She doesn't get very far. Rhea passes the pond just as a black reptile slithers before her feet, tripping her in one fluid motion. She crashes into a bed of rocks, skinning her knees. The girl doesn't even bother to wipe away the ichor leaking out. Grabbing clumps of broken stones, she flings it in its direction. But the basilisk is long gone by then.

The girl groans, face towards the sky. Perhaps she imagines her lofty sire up there, hair black as the night and sky-blue eyes radiating a frigidness Rhea has never quite known. Perhaps he's watching her now, laughing at her.

"You can try praying to him but he'll never answer."

She snaps her head towards the sound of a man's voice, stumbling back in her haste. Not once has a visitor come to these fields without seeking Gaia's permission first and she cannot understand what this means.

Rhea pauses.

He is more boy than man, she corrects. His proud, smooth jaw is the testament to his youth. He lacks the trimmed beards of her Titan brothers.

But he _is_ a Titan.

Rhea can feel it in her bones. He fails to exude the frightening yet weary aura of a Primordial like Tartarus or Ouranos. Yet he is powerful all the same – a little recognizable flicker that calls out to her very own.

He sits back in the knee-high grass, garbed in a dark yet lightweight tunic that leaves little to the imagination. She would think him Ouranos with his warrior's chest and regal face; his hair is dark enough and his skin fair enough, as well. But his eyes…

Gold.

Like the ichor running through her veins.

He speaks again in that voice: a deep timbre, quiet, inquisitive. But laced with a darkness Rhea herself cannot yet fathom.

"I never knew I had another sister." The look in his eyes, however, suggests more than mere curiosity.

"Nor I." Her own voice trembles. "A brother that is. But it is rare that Gaia allows me to leave."

"A shame. I would never forget a pretty face like yours."

_Fool_, Rhea chides herself. _You studied him for too long_. She stands, hiding her clammy hands behind her back. "I must head back. Before mother worries."

A lie. One he sniffs right away.

Kronos makes no move to get up. "Do you really want to go back there?" says he, flashing a lazy yet knowing grin.

She finds herself leaning in this time, not away. Her own question seems to burn right through her:_ just how much does he know?_

He speaks again before she can respond. "Stay a little longer, let me drink in your radiance a bit more. This is an opportunity I will not waste."

"You don't even know my name," she snaps.

"Do you know mine?"

"No. Should I?"

"Perhaps," he muses, "someday I may very well be a well-endowed lord."

It is her turn to smirk. "Careful, or our brothers may very well catch wind of such treacherous words."

Isolated but not ignorant. Oceanus is the eldest of the Titans, his domains encompassing the seas encircling their homeland. The land remains split between their four warring brothers: Koios to the north, Krios to the south, Iapetus to the east, and Hyperion to the west. There is no room for any other and they will not take kindly to a young, undisciplined immortal seeking his own rule.

His eyes only darken at the sight of her feline expression. "Smart girl." She wavers a bit, fearing she has made him more enamored. "Your name?"

The Titaness chews on the inside of her lip before responding. "Rhea."

"Like the flow of a river. Tranquil on the surface – a good deception for the current underneath."

_A current, yes_, she nearly tells him. _But you can neither see its depth nor magnitude_. "And what do I call you, brother?"

A gentle wind flows in from the east, coaxing a shiver despite the sun beating down on them. His silence holds for what seems like an eternity, a much longer pause than her own.

"Kronos."

* * *

Rhea cannot recall the last time Sky and Earth joined. They must have reunited once before, when she could hardly walk and Gaia had sent her to the sky palace of noble Aether and graceful Hemera.

Though the progeny of the sky-father, Rhea had never felt at peace amongst the heavenly clouds. It was the Earth she longed for, having never been separated from Gaia's breast until that moment.

But Hemera had laid a gentle hand on Rhea's tear-stricken face, telling of Gaia's predicament in bringing forth a new babe. It was then that little Rhea feared being replaced, trapped in the heavens forever, until Hemera offered her assurances.

_No one could ever replace _you.

And it must have been true, for upon her return, this babe Hemera had spoken of was gone with the wind, leaving no trace of its existence.

"When will I meet her?" Rhea had asked while being scooped up into her mother's arms.

Gaia, in her wisdom, had already known what the girl was alluding to. "He is fortunate to have passed Ouranos's test. Theia came to take him away."

Her eyebrows furrowed. "Did I pass the test?"

And Gaia had laughed at her. "Yes, little one. But you are here because you are very special to me."

Rhea had been pleased with that answer and she hadn't spared her new Titan brother a second thought.

Until now: golden eyes that haunt her dreams, the first of many. And, after a night of poor sleep, she is far from content sitting at her mother's side outside their hobble.

"It's easy," Gaia insists, the wind flowing through her black tresses, her golden hand worming through freshly tilled soil.

"There is no point to this exercise," the young Titaness utters in her frustration. She has no time for these lessons that bore her, not when she can be out in the fields running wild and free away from her mother's hovering gaze. "I cannot do all the things that you can. Best to leave at that."

"And I have no need for your abilities to surpass my own, Rhea," her mother soothes, though her stern tone is only a breath away, ready to reprimand at a moment's notice. "Do not make such a comparison. Otherwise, you will always be doomed to fail. So long as you are competent in mastering the little gifts I gave you, that is enough."

Rhea rolls her eyes. "I suppose you want me to try again."

"Again."

She starts, slowly this time, touching her fingers to her lips. The Titaness heaves a gentle sigh, taking from the reservoir of magic beneath her flesh, so much of it still so untouchable and locked away within, and breathing it into her palm. It swirls, sparks, volatile and untamable. Just like her.

_Just like me._

Rhea worms her fingers into the dirt again, eyes shut.

"Good," says Gaia. "Focus. Feel the world – feel _me _– beneath you. I will always be there, ever permanent."

She hardly listens, her mother's voice as distant as the wind. Her essence descends, searching, searching…

_Found_.

With all her might, she heaves her claws back to the surface. Glittering crystals burst forth from the ground.

Rhea beams. "There. Are we done?"

Gaia's eyes shimmer. For a moment, Rhea thinks it might be a mother's pride that she sees, certainly a rare sight from the Earth Mother. But it disappears when she looks to the sky.

At the sound of Gaia's short intake of breath, Rhea follows her mother's gaze to the horizon beyond. Thin clouds swirl – a mixture of red and gray – into a funnel formation, reaching out towards the earth.

"What is it?"

It takes Rhea a moment to realize the strange formation moving across the landscape – getting _closer_.

"Ouranos."

Gently, she touches her mother's shoulder. "I don't understand. Is he angry with you?"

Gaia purses her lips, eyes still on the wild horizon. "Your lesson for today is over." She stands and helps Rhea to her feet. "You must leave and I must… prepare."

"For?"

The goddess opens her mouth as if to answer but quickly decides against it. "_Go_," she says finally.

Still, Rhea lingers, confused and a bit hurt at being left out on the plains. Even though she had desired such a thing but moments ago. "Where?"

"Far," is her mother's only answer before the door closes on her.

The funnel grows closer. Rhea's jaw clenches at the sight. With arms crossed, she heads towards it, though aware it was Gaia's intention to have her run in the opposite direction.

Her heart thunders in her chest as she grows near. Not even a half-mile off and the wind whips through her hair, sends it flying.

Inside the funnel, the clouds thicken and a face appears. Though formless, lacking in definition, it seems familiar. She has seen him in her own noble features, small details she couldn't quite place until now.

Ouranos.

Without warning, the hem of her skirt lifts off the ground. Rhea pushes it down as quickly as she can. But, before she can wonder if it was his intention, the face of her father disappears back into the center of the whirlwind.

Skin crawling, Rhea finally sprints towards the pond. She curses out her frustration, her exhaustion.

"I would not think such words befitting a lady such as yourself."

The Titaness slowly turns her head to find Kronos seated by the lakebed. She cannot say she is excited to see him, but at least there will be a witness if the Sky-father comes for her. It isn't a true comfort for Rhea – Ouranos can do whatever he wants and he is rarely deterred once his mind is set on something – but it is the only one that can be mustered up on such short notice.

"You again." She purses her lips. "Does mother know that you're here?"

"Contrary to what you may think, Gaia does not make it a habit to keep an eye on her children. We are too far and too numerous." The full weight of his gaze settles on her. "She rather put most of her attention on you. Though I would not blame her."

Her cheeks burn and she loathes him for it. "Why are you here?"

"The Earth whispers to me."

Rhea scoffs before Kronos can elaborate. _A superstitious fool_. Of course, she has never doubted her mother's prophetic powers before, having heard them from Gaia's very own mouth on more than one occasion. But she was never one to breathe in sulfurous smoke from volcanic vents in the ground in an attempt to perform her very own palm reading.

His eyes narrow. "And why are _you _here? Why be out here all on your own without our mother in-toe? From what I gather, you seem distressed when she is not in the vicinity."

"She would not tell me," Rhea answers, too perplexed to be offended by her brother's last statement. "Something about… Ouranos. About preparing for his arrival."

His eyes shutter with realization. "I see."

Rhea kneels, leaning in closer to him. Her voice softens. "I don't…"

A smile tugs at his lips. "The Sky yearns to embrace his woman, the Earth Mother," he says slowly, as if it should be apparent. "It is very clear why she did not want you around for that."

Her eyes widen and her embarrassment is far more apparent than before. _Little fool, in more ways than one. _"I—"

"The maiden of the Phrygian plains," he cuts her off with a chuckle. Kronos leans back to survey her. "She is a true maiden after all."

Rhea finds it difficult to look at him when he says this. Her eyes take to the sky instead – now having faded into hues of orange as the sun dips below the horizon at a leisurely pace, purple clouds creeping forth as Nyx comes to set the world to rest. All of it a rare sight to behold.

"It's beautiful in a way," she admits with cheeks still flushed. "Hyperion and Helios can take their time now that father is… occupied."

Kronos says nothing further, but she can feel his stare.

* * *

And so Earth and Sky join once more. And once, as Gaia had told her long ago upon Rhea's first flowering, is all it takes.

It is not long before Gaia's belly swells with new life. And, though it is Gaia who will be a mother once again, it is Rhea who finds herself reinvigorated.

She volunteers to perform the errands in the Primordial's stead: traveling along time-worn routes to spring up trees and flowers, gathering ingredients for spells, teleporting to Theia or Phoebe's domains bearing messages. The tasks vary by day, but the nights do not.

Rhea returns by nightfall, taxed by her travels but determined to keep to her ritual. Gaia remains in bed, having spent most of the day at rest, though her hands continue to weave new creations into existence.

Rhea sits by her side, her hands creeping to her mother's stomach to feel the lively movements of her unborn sibling. The life within always seems so eager to greet her.

"Why I send you so far and wide," Gaia muses. "It's never so active when you are gone."

Rhea only smiles. "Perhaps he likes me more."

"Perhaps." Gaia raises a brow. "He?"

She nods, confident in her reveal. "Watch."

Her mother hums, but no argument comes. This is the most peace the two have had in years. "I fear that when you become a mother you will put the rest of us to shame."

Rhea holds Gaia's gaze. "When he comes do not send me away. I would be by your side."

"Little Rhea fancies herself a woman now." Her words lack their bitter edge compared to the last time Rhea heard them. "Very well."

She makes good on her vow.

The labor lasts for three days and three nights, with Gaia's bloodletting screams just as relentless.

The Earth trembles all around them. Rhea keeps a hand on her mother's belly, while her eyes remain glued to the widening space between her mother's thighs. The ichor flows in waves and Rhea remains mildly horrified until a hand greets her.

And another.

And another.

And then a dozen more at least.

With one last groan, the babe slips out from between Gaia's bloody thighs and Rhea catches him. The ichor stains her hands and his stormy cries are deafening, but the girl doesn't care. Even past all the limbs and heads she only sees perfection.

She turns back to Gaia. "You did it, mother. A boy."

The goddess chuckles as she lies back down into the mat. "We did it, Rhea."

She watches her mother for the rest of the day – listens to her as well – as Gaia shows Rhea how the babe is nursed, and soothed, and held, and coddled. She listens as her mother tells her stories of Rhea as a babe, so incredibly demanding but sweet.

"I shall name him Briares," Gaia says after a time, when the promise of sleep has dulled their speech and already claimed Rhea's new brother.

"Briares," the Titaness nods, her own body growing heavy. Finally realizing that she has not rested for days. But, on this rare occasion, she feels at peace. Almost as if whatever trouble that had once brewed between her and Gaia has now been mended.

But a peace not destined to last.

It takes only a day for Gaia to weaken. She stays close to the bed, never moving more than a few steps and only to grab a hold of Briares. But there comes a point where even that proves too difficult and Gaia cannot stand at all.

A nervous Rhea flutters around the home like a hummingbird. "The weather outside is strange today, mother," she says in the doorway of their home, the entrance cracked to catch a peek of the world beyond these thin walls. Her brother lies cradled in her arms, still dozing.

Her mother says nothing, her eyes already half-closed.

"The sky is black," she continues, attempting to ease the constant waves of anxiety plaguing her in the face of Gaia's strange affliction. "It's too early for Erebus and Nyx to ascend. Phoebe has yet to stir the moon to action."

"Get inside. Stay close," the goddess murmurs, sickness slurring her words together.

More dutiful than normal, Rhea shuts the door, her frown a permanent fixture on her face. "Is something wrong?"

Her eyelids flutter as she tries to sit up. "The blackened sky – it is Ouranos's decree." Her mother lets out a little moan of pain. "The babe is not to his standards."

_The test. He has not passed the test._

"What does that mean?" She skitters to Gaia's side, placing a free hand on her forehead. "Mother, you're burning."

The goddess tries to slap her hand away but her arm falls without warning, lacking in energy. "He gives me the fever. Ensures I cannot fight back," she sneers, though having since lost her bite. "Do not fight him, Rhea. For your sake and mine."

"Who—"

The door cracks open, straight down the middle. Rhea screams and her fright is not entirely unfounded. Stepping through the threshold, his gaze still as terrible as from the day of their last meeting, comes Tartarus.

"Why is he here?" she retorts, throwing herself back against the furthest wall. "Why has he come back?"

Gaia offers no response.

The dark Primordial cranes his head at the hundred-handed child.

"_No_," she blurts out. Rhea cradles the baby on her hip, her clawed hand outstretched and pulsing with a golden light. "No, I won't let you!"

In the timespan of a blink, Tartarus appears before her suddenly and grabs her wrist. _Hellfire made flesh_. The contact singes her to the bone and Briares is torn away before she can retaliate. Her brother screeches. His hundred arms flail, hands grasping for Rhea, for Gaia, but to no avail. Without giving any thought to self-preservation, she dives at Tartarus.

A single point of his finger stops Rhea in her tracks. The walking void finally sets his withering glare upon her.

Rhea's bloodcurdling screams cut through the plains for miles, loud enough that even Ouranos must finally hear her. _This is the worse than the last time, _she thinks before the pain reaches a point where words are beyond her. _It has to be worse._

Her body trembles as if caught in its own earthquake. The air in her lungs turns to sulfur and she chokes on her own screams.

Gaia vaults up from her bed. "Tartarus, please!" She falls to his feet – not that would have had the strength to stand otherwise – and clenches at his scorching robes. "Spare her, please," she begs and Rhea has never seen someone as resilient as the Earth Mother brought so low. "Do what you came here to do and be gone!"

His hand lowers and the convulsions cease.

Gaia collects Rhea in her arms and weeps. "I'm sorry. I should've sent you away," she whispers. "I'm sorry."

Tartarus steals one last thing before parting ways with them: a single tear dripping down the goddess's cheek.

Just as he dematerializes, Rhea sits up, gasping. "The child, mother. Briares."

Gaia shuts her eyes in frustration, clenched fist pressed against her chest as if she knows her next words will go unheard. "Rhea. Don't."

She stumbles out from their hobble, away from the goddess, her mind a fog of pain. She hardly registers her mother crying after her.

At one-point, Rhea must have collapsed because, in the next second, she finds herself on all fours, unable to move, screaming for Tartarus. For Briares.

Rhea climbs to her feet again, clings to whatever strength she has buried deep down, and runs. She cannot be sure where to: Tartarus is no longer in her line of sight and she herself has never journeyed to the Underworld.

_But I have to try._

She does not get far when a boom sounds across the nighttime sky. A load drops into the plains before her and she throws her hands up to shield her eyes from the dust kicked up in its wake.

"Rhea," says a familiar voice. Hands wrap around her forearms. "Don't go any farther."

Kronos.

Her head whirls, still stinging. "Tartarus. If he returns to—"

"Let him be," he says, his voice firm. "Follow them, try to interfere, and Ouranos will brand you as a traitor. That's even _if _you can outsmart dreadful Tartarus. Either path ends with you burning in the Pit alongside them."

"I care not!" she hisses, struggling against him. "Unhand me!"

"Don't be foolish. Gaia would not want this; it is why she sent me running after you," he speaks quickly, though his explanation does nothing to placate her. "You will _stay_," Kronos snaps finally.

She bristles. "And who are _you _to decide what I do? A _coward_."

He jaw clenches. "Rhea…"

"Only a coward would do nothing. You sit by as a brother of yours—" she, of course, doesn't miss the small sneer that permeates his lips in suggesting their relation to the hundred-handed child "—is taken by that _thing _on the orders of our sire. That I cannot forgive."

The anger fades and a wall goes up, cloaked at first with an emotion she does not recognize. "What would you have me do, little one?"

"Anything but stare at me with…" Rhea conflates a little, her voice dipping into barely more than a whisper. "With pity."

Kronos shakes his head. "You should not love them. To be loved is not their fate."

_And yet I will all the same, _she wants to tell him, but the words stick in her throat. She falls to her knees, her arms wrapped around her chest so that every reverberation of a sob she can feel it twice-fold. To wallow in that pain – exactly as Tartarus would want.

Kronos kneels before her and she is not sure why she finds comfort in this. Rhea feels his fingers lightly tap the edge of her jaw, signaling her to look at him. "Be at mother's side. Soothe her loss with your return before she rips this world apart at the seams."

Rhea does not have to energy to be ashamed of the tears lining her eyes. "She would be right to do so."

"Soothing her anger does not mean she will forget." He leans in to whisper in her ear. "The child was not the first to be banished to the Pit. Noble blood or otherwise. But, perhaps, he will be the last."

* * *

Rhea has never seen Gaia with Kronos. Nor has she seen him in her home, and perhaps for good reason.

She keeps her eyes averted, her attention drawn to avoid Gaia's wrath. She decides to mend the holes in her gowns – no matter how small – in an effort to keep herself busy. None of it helps as Rhea feels his eyes glued to her every move.

Rhea muzzles the part of herself that wishes to scream at him to leave, that she has not forgiven him for Briares's abduction and he has no right to be near her let alone look at her ever again. But the sane voice in her head reminds her that he is Gaia's guest. Though for what purpose, she cannot say.

He is not the only one who comes.

It is Iapetus first. He must be her eldest brother, Rhea thinks, for he is so large. Large enough to grab her by the skull and crack it open like a nut. But he pays her no mind – he brushes past her without greeting, following Gaia into the next room far away from nosy Titan girls – and for that Rhea is grateful.

He leaves all the same.

It is only the beginning of the stream of visitors:

Oceanus comes next and also ignores her. Then Hyperion, who looks at her with such clinical curiosity it is as if he is trying to picture how she might look set aflame. Koios she finds the opposite; his visit must be the shortest of them all but the goose flesh rises up and down her arms for several hours later. Krios follows, his glinting black eyes sparkling with a hunger she has never seen before. To be quenched by no food, no water on Gaia's earth. It is a look that makes her cheeks warm and guts tighten.

She cannot run away fast enough, despite the piles of quartz sprouting within her home. _Gaia always leaves behind quartz when she's scheming, _her elder sister, Theia, once told her. Whatever these schemes are, Rhea is clearly not privy to them.

None of her brothers ever return to her home, save Kronos.

Sometimes he arrives too soon for mother to notice, her gaze on the blue sky with too much trepidation. And sometimes she forgets Rhea seated in the corner tending to flowers, in her room counting lions' teeth.

But Kronos never forgets. No matter how many words are whispered in his ear by Gaia, no matter how many times Rhea moves and tries to ignore him, his gaze tracks her. The foreign flames that ignite within her are perhaps a hundred times worse than whatever Hyperion might have had in mind.

Though she is a fool to assume Gaia _never _notices their behavior.

"Why does Kronos look at you as if you're the answer to all of his problems?" Gaia asks her one night when Rhea has set herself to growing moonlace just outside their entrance. "I do hope your maidenhood is still intact."

She rips her hand free from the dirt, color rising in her cheeks. "My maidenhood is none of your concern," she retorts. "Who am I to keep him from staring? Who am I to know what foolish thoughts are floating about in his imagination?"

Gaia only hums. A spire of glowing metal punches straight through the topsoil, startling Rhea. It reeks of the Earth's core.

"What is that for?" she asks but isn't at all surprised to meet Gaia's glare.

"None of your concern," her mother affirms. "Tend to your flowers and tend to your lions. If Kronos decides to start staring again, make yourself scarce. We have business to attend to and I need him focused."

"It's not my fault!"

"I never said it was, yet my words still stand."

Gaia returns inside, remaining there for what seems like ages. Day and night, she spares not even a glance Rhea's way, hunched over the unknown metal pulled from the ground, melting it, molding it.

So many weeks pass that Rhea has difficulty keep count. Until one morning the metal is gone. She prays it's a sign that her life will finally return to normal.

Before the dawn even rises, Gaia orders her to vacate the house. Rhea protests, of course, but her mother becomes more insistent than usual.

The air remains unremorsefully frigid. She has time to see the sunrise now but, still, Rhea can't help but fume by the shimmering water of the pond.

She finds sunrise unusually beautiful this morning – as if caught in the throes of passion. With a blush blooming on her sun-kissed skin, Rhea knows the meaning of her mother's request to leave so soon.

Ouranos's arrival.

And, if Rhea knows her sire well enough, her presence could very well spark his short temper. Best to not be caught in the crossfire again this time. She can smell the crackling ozone from here, knowing it must be stronger under the roof where her father lusts for her mother. Surely an affair to avoid at all costs.

An indignant scream – no, _roar_ – quickly banishes those thoughts into oblivion. Rhea jumps to her feet when she senses something wrong. The birds crowing in the field for their morning meal sense it too and they take flight, wings beating furiously as they flee.

She turns towards the direction of Gaia's home and three things happen in that moment: deafening thunder crackles across the cloudless sky, the horizon turns a frightening shade of red, and a sudden, terrible gust of wind makes her fall.

In the chaos, she screams for her mother. Rhea claws her way back to her feet, eyes barely open as the dirt and leaves whip through the air. The wind blows hard enough to peel skin off bone.

And then nothing.

The wind stops, as does the thunder. Only the sky does not change.

Rhea runs, knowing something terrible has happened. Panic, however, leaves no time for speculation.

She slams face-first into what seems like a statue. Strong hands steady her.

_Not a statue._

Kronos stands before her, black garments painted with ichor. Ichor, she realizes, that is not his own. From behind him – straight from her and Gaia's abode – wild cheering erupts.

"What did you do?" she retorts, unable to peel her eyes from the ichor splatter. "What did you do!?"

"What I had to," Kronos responds. He doesn't let go of Rhea, not even as she attempts to reel away.

Blinking rapidly, she says, rather sharply, "What are you doing?"

Kronos begins to walk and she still does not comprehend at first, her mind oddly blank.

"I struck a deal with Gaia," he says with the utmost calm. Rhea digs her feet into the ground but he remains unperturbed. "All the moons I spent in your home, it was for one purpose only. Kill Ouranos in exchange for our sire's crown… and you."

Her heart plummets into her stomach. "What?"

The first half of his statement Rhea alone can barely process: Her father? Gone just like that? She never cared for Ouranos, no, but the idea of him falling to Kronos's blade is frightening in and of itself. Especially when this same man has her in his grasp.

_In exchange for our sire's crown…and you._

She shrieks, "No! Let me go _kinslayer_."

Kronos shrugs. "Suit yourself." Before she knows it, he picks her up like a doll, throwing her over his shoulder.

"What are you _doing_?!" The scream becomes stuck in her throat. "For the love of Chaos, I am no toy!"

"No, you are not," he agrees simply. "You will be a queen."

"Queen of what? Your bed?"

"Amongst other things," he remarks.

Her panic surges and sours. Rhea does the only thing she _can _do in a moment like this: she bites him.

Her teeth sink home; Kronos throws her down quickly, eager to be rid of her. The young Titaness lands on her ass. She scrambles back, refusing to take her eyes off of him.

His own gaze narrows. "Gods be good, you truly are a wild creature."

"And you a brute," she spits as he comes to kneel before her. She shakes from anger, a raging lion still. "But how could I expect anything else after what you've done?"

Kronos only laughs, outstretching his hand to brush against her burning cheek. Perhaps it is a day of the unexpected because Rhea most certainly does not expect him to kiss her.

Her initial instinct is to freeze but anger burns through her, boiling her blood. Even more so when Rhea finds his hand prodding her breast through her silk tunic.

She slaps his face, hard, just as Gaia might have taught her. But, of course, it only makes him laugh _harder _this time.

"Get away from me," Rhea seethes, but she knows his grasp is too firm. But before her thoughts can stray elsewhere, Kronos's penetrating gaze consumes her every thought.

"I am patient when it suits me," he says, the humor having vanished. His tongue swipes at his bottom lip and, to her shame, Rhea cannot help but stare. "I will take my time with you, sweet Rhea. I will let you play your games – deny me all you want, though it is well within my rights to take you here and now."

"Without prior consent, my right is to loosen a tooth of yours at the attempt," she threatens, though they both know her words ring hollow. She could do next to nothing to stop him and now she knows no one will come to her aid. Not even Gaia.

"Even so," he says with eyes half-lidded. "Our fates are tied. You cannot change that."


	3. Pride

The days following Ouranos's death, Rhea finds herself led like cattle. With little say otherwise, they march her to the sea to watch her father's body desecrated and her elder brother shamed for his absence. Then to Othrys, where she is made to swear fealty to her new king along with the rest of the Titan spawn roaming the earth. To her surprise, the petty war forced upon them by Ouranos over this jutting piece of rock has come to an end. Soon, it will become Kronos's palace – an odd way, she thinks, to cement peace.

And once built, a palace she will be expected to share with him as his bride.

A piece of news Kronos has yet to announce. Though it's only a matter of time – throughout all of the proceedings, Rhea half-wonders when they plan to tie her up and drag her to her wedding ceremony next.

Her only relief – if it can even be considered relief – is that Kronos catching her unawares in her sleep is no longer a possibility. Ouranos's Curse, the last words uttered before his passing, had made sure of it:

_Of all the wakeful nights I spent watching to see who would dethrone me, may yours in this new reign be just as restless. For a child you sire is destined to depose you, just as you have done to me. _

She had not been alone in her hope that those dangerous words were meant for Kronos alone. But the night following, as Rhea tried to seek rest from a day of tumultuous events, slumber eluded her. As it did for them all. As it would forever. For Kronos had not been alone in his coup; the same ichor she found painting the robes of Kronos had also stained the hands of Hyperion, Iapetus, Krios, and Koios. All of them having an important role to play in Gaia's great plot that had been hatched under Rhea's very own roof.

They save Kronos's coronation for last – the final event to cement his ascension as Titan Lord and positioning over the universe. A sure sign that there can be no turning back and the days of Primordials are at an end.

In the grand scheme of it all, Rhea feels absurdly small. Though much of it is her own doing as well – she stands close to the back of her brothers and sisters, certainly never the tallest among them. A pale gray shawl covers much of her face, her shoulders, her body. Ever the wraith, blending in more amongst the clouds than with her own flesh and blood.

Kronos still spots her in the crowd.

Rhea's mouth sets into a firm line. Behind a seated Kronos, Gaia sways with his deadly scythe in her hands, murmuring words the Titaness has no interest of hearing. Not when all she can think of is how long she has before this coronation is over and Kronos is free to declare her his betrothed.

_How long? _her eyes scream at him.

His gaze does not waver.

_Soon_.

Rhea wraps her shawl tighter. Though her face does not change, Kronos clenches his fist as if he knows exactly what she is about to do. Gaia, distracted and with eyes closed, cannot stop her. He, in the middle of his coronation, cannot stop her.

She turns away from him, from the coronation ceremony.

She vanishes.

* * *

Rhea attempts to go home only once.

It is a strange whim she has whilst wandering the Phrygian plains. She cannot be sure what makes her journey in this direction, only that she recognizes the roof of her little hobble in the distance and it is far too late to turn back now.

Her heart sinks as she gets closer.

The signs of desertion are already apparent. The birds which once nested in the thatch roof have taken over completely, their chirps near deafening as she reaches the front door. The door itself lies split in two on the ground, the wood nearly disintegrated and crawling with termites. The bed she once slept in – a bed she no longer has use for – lies collapsed and covered in animal droppings.

She can hardly take it all in without feeling her emotions swell. In her youth, not once had she considered her existence here just a short blimp in time. Otherwise Rhea might have cherished this humble life more.

"You came back."

Rhea turns around slowly, leveling a leaden glare. "And you left this place abandoned."

"Think what you may, I am a sentimental creature."

Gaia breezes in through the doorway, her thin garments fluttering as she turns to sweep her gaze over their old hobble. She brushes her hand over the fragments of Rhea's bed. As if reversing time, it mends itself instantaneously, shit-free.

She sits atop it with legs crossed. "Once a bird leaves the nest, mother has no reason to stay."

Rhea purses her lips. "Things could have gone differently."

"Is that so?"

Her mouth twitches, trying and failing to contain her boiling anger. "You promised me to him without consulting me."

"I did what I had to." Gaia scoffs. "Better Kronos than Ouranos. Would you have wanted that? For your sire to one day realize just how grown and womanly little Rhea had become?"

Rhea stiffens. _That day in the field… _"You still should have told me."

Her mother waves her off and Rhea cannot pinpoint why the gesture hurts so much when it has been done to her a thousand times already. "Your knowledge on the matter would have changed nothing. Your fates were tied together long ago."

"You do not decide my fate!" she snaps

"You're right." Gaia casts her gaze past Rhea to the open door. "But neither do you."

Rhea follows her stare, only to swear she will combust right there and then. Kronos leans in the doorway, ever the youth she met all that time ago, only now he wears his onyx circlet inlaid with sapphires the size of river stones. A hideous display of newfound wealth and privilege.

_The sky crown of Ouranos. _

Rhea's whips around to face her mother for another round of screaming only to find Gaia herself has disappeared.

"She said that you would come back here." To her surprise, his arrogant smile is largely absent. "That you always do."

Another ruse from great Gaia herself. "Not anymore," she whispers, barreling for the exit, but Kronos snatches her arm in a vice grip.

She feels the silver lining her eyes but refuses to let her hellish gaze soften. "Let go of me."

She cannot be sure what persuades him to listen to her. He is king now and need not bow to anyone but himself.

His hand falls away from her arm.

And Rhea flees once again.

* * *

Despite how far she journeys away from mainland Greece, away from the sea and deeper into the Phrygian plains, Kronos still finds her.

She roams the plains with a wooden staff in hand, ever the shepherd, but it is not sheep she leads. Sleek yellow lions follow in her wake, a group of sisters to guard her in her travels. Though she knows very well a creature like the Titan Lord is not to be deterred for long.

Wind parts the grass before them. The sluggish cats mosey along, knowing it is not in their favor for a hunt. Any prey they find will surely catch a whiff of them long before they can approach. Rhea changes their course towards a nearby oasis – best to have liquid fill their bellies than nothing at all.

But as she does, something large catches her eye, resting at the foot of the hills. A silver male awaits them in the distance.

The lionesses pause, sniffing the air. A male is not a strange sight in these parts and it has been a while since one has graced them with his company. An opportunity to diversify their breeding stock is always a welcomed one, but Rhea finds it odd she does not recognize him when she knows all of the cats roaming these plains.

Then she catches sight of those eyes – liquid gold.

She curses aloud and turns away in the opposite direction. Though like a daemon, once spotted, Rhea doubts she will be able to shake him again.

* * *

"Go," Rhea tells the lions several days later. The wind is in their favor, ideal for a hunt, and she knows her presence – and the ghost following her – would be an unwelcomed distraction. They slink off into the sea of yellowing grass.

Rhea sighs and drops to her knees, thin gown fanning out like a pressed flower beneath her. The Titaness studies her hands, her arms, counting the number of golden freckles that have since appeared since her many months – years, perhaps – of travelling the plains.

A rustling in the grass sounds behind her and Rhea might have mistaken it for the wind if she wasn't expecting his approach. "With all the time you spend stalking me as a lion you should be usurped by now."

A brief pause follows. "I noticed your males rarely fight." When she turns her head, she finds Kronos sitting in the tall grass alongside her. For a moment, it feels as if nothing has changed: she is still residing under Gaia's roof and he has yet to kill their father or resolve to thoroughly ruin Rhea's life. "They look large and impressive, roar to make everyone aware of their presence. Yet, in the end, they all know their place. Who truly rules."

"And the females have no need to play such games," she retorts. "They go for the throat immediately or not at all."

"Except when they mate." He smirks. "The most elaborate game of all."

Rhea rolls her eyes. She hardly needs a lesson on lion behavior from him. "Go away."

He takes her rebuff with ease. "That is no way to speak to a king."

"Forgive me, my lord. Not all of us were raised as preening cocks on Othrys."

"You always speak from the heart, Rhea," he chuckles. "Truly, it is a breath of fresh air from those preening cocks you are so fond of."

"I'm glad you find me amusing."

"Always."

She whips around to face him. "I want no part in this blood trade you and Gaia brokered. I want no part of this empire you have built on sinful foundation."

The humor fades from his face. "Of all of Ouranos's loyal supporters, you are the most unexpected."

"I will never support that tyrant, I swear it on my life-thread. Yet the laws of the cosmos – that which you cannot change, not even as king – are clear."

He cocks his head, leaning in closer to catch her eye once more. "Do you fear me then, little beast?"

"Fearing you. Fearing _for _you." In Rhea's mind they are not wholly different. "Is that not wise?"

"Rhea of the wild things, oh so very wise." His knuckles stroke her cheek. "You deserve the world. If you married me, I would gladly lay it at your feet."

She does not waver. "No."

His hand falls away. Kronos stands, dusting the grass from his tunic. "I will come back then in the hopes you change your mind."

Rhea snorts. "Come back tomorrow and you will find my answer the same."

"In time we shall see."

She purses her lips. "I suppose we shall."

* * *

In a way, Rhea must appreciate his tenacity. Most gods, she thinks, would have moved on to more fruitful endeavors. It matters not how quick nor how far she travels. Any sign of first light and he appears on the horizon as a sleek white lion, surveying Rhea and her pride with those gilded eyes. And when the light of the day fades, Kronos approaches with the same proposal on his lips.

_Marry me. Become my queen. _

Her answer, as she warned him, remains the same.

In her refusal, Rhea avoids her mother too – she stays far away from Gaia's places of worship: sacred caves, cracks in the earth, anywhere her presence is strong enough to manifest. The longer she can put off a scolding from the Earth Mother, the better. Particularly since the sting of betrayal has not faded quite yet.

On one particular morning, Rhea nearly thinks the other Titans have been recruited into Kronos's desperate bid for her hand in marriage. For, as soon as the sun comes up, she finds Hyperion's gaze especially oppressive, setting her body to perspire in a manner most unnatural of immortals and her brown skin to burn.

_Kronos's doing, _she muses, _to force me away from the plains. _Though even a Phrygia on fire she finds more tolerable than the darkness of Othrys.

But one glance at the hill in the distance tells her that this has nothing to do with Titan Lord's frequent visits.

Rhea scrambles up the grassy mound, her eyebrows furrowed. "I would have dressed better if I knew your arrival imminent."

Theia glances over her shoulder with a knowing, radiant smile. "No. You wouldn't have."

The Titaness brushes the dirt from her chiton. "I would have considered it in the very least." Her lips purse. "You're pregnant. Again."

She pats her swollen belly. "Our numbers have grown by half at least. Amazing all the sex you can have when there is no Sky-father to sneer his disapproval."

Rhea shrinks back and the tinge of color painting her cheeks does not escape Theia's note.

Her tinkling laugh fills the air. "Ah yes, I forget beautiful Rhea is a maiden still. Though not for lack of suitors."

"I have suitors?" Rhea feigns. "I would've thought Kronos order them executed."

"I'm sure he has tried," her sister muses. Theia pauses for a moment, her pale eyes suddenly dissecting her every move. "You refuse him still?"

She picks at her nails, seeming disinterested. "Does he sulk?"

Theia only sighs. "You are promised, Rhea."

"A scheme made without my knowledge or approval. Gaia has yet to command me to fulfill such contract. So here I remain."

Her sister seems unsurprised. "She will grow desperate soon. Kronos has not freed our siblings from the Pit. Nor will he, for as long as you remain unwed."

Rhea's gaze snaps to hers. "Why would he do such a thing?"

"He had the resolve to kill our sire." Their eyes flicker upwards to the blue expanse above their heads. "You will find him full of surprises and void of mercy."

_And is sending you here one of those surprises? _

Wise Theia catches on to her suspicion immediately and rolls her eyes. "Hush now, he did not send me. But I suppose it's best to talk of lighter things now." She stands a little straighter, placing a hand a top her bulging stomach. "We celebrate our child's birth, Hyperion and I, now fast approaching. Kronos will play host to us on Othrys and I would see you join in the festivities."

Rhea hesitates. "It has been… a very long time since I've been on Othrys."

"All the more reason to come. And _stay_, so that you may be there when a new Titan is born. Mother raves at how you are the perfect midwife." The indecision on Rhea's face remains, which must anger Theia greatly. Her small face bunches up. "I was the one who helped Gaia bring you into this world. Shall I call in that debt?"

Her resolve flounders. "No, I will come."

Theia's scowl fades, replaced by a beaming smile. "Don't worry. I will keep our brother well away from you if that is what you wish."

* * *

A promise quickly discarded.

Though Rhea finds it difficult to blame Theia, considering the crafty nature of her intended. For in the middle of the feast, Kronos himself gifts the expecting mother a trove of sapphires from the Far East.

"Those outside our borders pay homage to my ascent to the throne," he proclaims, standing from his seat at the head of the table. To Rhea's great displeasure, she found herself seated closer to him than her typical standing would suggest as the youngest daughter of Gaia and Ouranos. Of course, it had been to the displeasure of Themis and Mmnesyone as well, who had regarded her throughout the festivities with their jealous glares.

"Yet I have no use for them," Kronos continues, and Rhea finds that statement more than true. For the only sapphires that had ever interested him were the ones embedded in Ouranos's crown. _His _crown.

An army of cupbearers hoist the chests above their shoulders, displaying the treasures to all the gathered Titans and Primordials. Theia in all her hunger does not take her eyes off them, Rhea seated at her side forgotten. Her sister's love for a shining hoard trumps all else.

"Thank you, brother," Hyperion intones with little enthusiasm, as if he too has since grown exhausted with his wife's obsessions. He stands from his own seat wedged in between his wife and the Titan Lord, giving Kronos a minor bow. "As always, I am in your debt."

Their king smiles. The band of nymphs continue on with their music.

"Excuse me," Rhea murmurs, unsurprised that Theia does not even glance her way. _Perhaps it is not too late to escape this madness, _she thinks to herself as she rises from the table.

She couldn't be all the more wrong. The Titaness can hardly grasp for another cup of fermented nectar before he swoops in like carrion on a carcass.

"Are you enjoying yourself?" Kronos says pleasantly enough, but Rhea knows better.

Her glare is her answer. "First, none of our Titan brethren have even attempted to look my way throughout these festivities. Now a gift to occupy Theia's attention. Do I have enough proof you are conspiring against me?"

"I am only a man, Rhea," he gives as a simple reply. All the confirmation she needs. "What else would you have me do?"

"End this folly. Though that seems unlikely." She crosses her arms. "I do hope not _all _of this is part of your scheme."

"Ah yes, even down to the part where I impregnated Theia myself in the most complex plan in the universe just to have you grace my halls." He rolls his eyes. "I have many feasts here on Othrys, Rhea. After all, a peacock has need to preen."

"And the Titan Lord has need to flaunt. I know that very well."

"Precisely." The world rumbles low in his chest. "Though I will admit I had hoped for your presence here tonight."

"In the hopes that Othrys would sway me?" Rhea pauses a moment, wondering if she should take the bait. "I think you would agree that my aptitude is better suited for the grasslands."

"I would think this a nice change in pace." He takes a sip of nectar, the smile on his face positively feline. "Even with my pestering, you must be lonely in the wilds."

_Two can play at this game_. "I assume these feasts are not constant," she bites back with as much grace as she can muster. Gaia, for all her failings as a mother, taught her well in this regard. "You must be lonely as well."

"And why I would prefer to share this place with my wife," Kronos answers smoothly, unperturbed.

Rhea bristles. "I am not your wife."

"You could be." Perhaps she had enjoyed their banter from before his ascent to kingship. No longer, when it is clear that life on Othrys has done nothing but to hone his craft. "Gaia isolated you so. Kept you from the friendship of your sisters, from embracing Titanhood. Were you to marry me, I could just as easily bring you back into the fold."

Without thinking, her eyes drift towards her radiant sisters. She cannot help but think back to all the lonely moments she sat upon her bed, wishing for the comfort of a family beyond stony-faced Gaia. "Do you spend all those quiet hours in the middle of the night thinking of arguments to persuade me with?"

"Always," he says without hesitance.

The look in her eyes darkens. "Ask me again—"

Kronos takes a step forward, a last attempt to corner her in their little alcove. "Rhea…"

Anger rushes through her veins. She pushes him back. "—tomorrow. For tonight my answer to you is no."

Kronos snorts. "You are as unmoving as Gaia herself."

"_That _sort of flattery will get you nowhere," she says to him, before moseying on out of sight.

The Titan Lord broods for the rest of the night and Rhea can't help but be pleased.

Theia might not have kept her promise, but Rhea most certainly does. She stays with Theia until the birth of rosy Eos, whom Rhea cradles against her chest, watching as the babe causes the sky to bleed red at the first signs of sunrise. It reminds her of the death of Ouranos.

_Perhaps Eos will give the phenomena new meaning._

The door parts before young Helios, thin and scrawny-legged. Closer to manhood than childhood now and Rhea cannot help but think on the last time she saw him. Holding his hand comes little Selene, a child still. Both here to greet their new sister.

Behind them enters Kronos.

"My lord." An exhausted Theia still shines more radiant than the sun. She pats Selene's silver hair when the girl approaches. "Another Titan to add to your ranks."

Kronos nods, though his gaze fixates on Rhea. Under the scrutiny, Eos in her arms stirs. From her back, sweeping orange wings unfurl like a butterfly from its cocoon.

"Chaos has blessed us indeed," he says, but his eyes hardly glance in the infant's direction. To Rhea's dismay, they reflect a certain fondness for her that she cannot quite place. It makes her mouth run dry.

Rhea does not linger in lieu of Hyperion's arrival. She murmurs no excuses when passing the winged babe to Helios, eager to slip from the room before Kronos can stop her.

* * *

Her return to the plains is more than welcomed, as is Kronos's initial absence. The relief she feels not having the king of the universe trailing her every move cannot be overstated. A life of independence and peace is the only thing she has ever wanted for so long now.

But, now that she has it and weeks pass on by without interruption, Rhea senses something in her has changed. An ache in her heart that she cannot shake.

An ache she _should _be able to shake. Especially in the most tender of moments when the great cats, having longed for their mistress's return, encircle her in a great pile upon their time to retire for the night. The purring cubs, lacking in boundaries, cling to her chest. She runs a hand over their soft fur but, for some reason, even they are unable to drive away her worries this time.

Instead, Rhea imagines them as babes of her own, clawing at her breast, looking up at her with loving eyes. Sometimes she imagines it isn't the lionesses that surround her, but her sisters and their respective brood.

_It's a life I could have, _Rhea reminds herself when the daydream stretches on too far. _I need only say yes. _

Such contemplation leaves her in a distant mood. She finds herself perched atop one of the tallest hills the following morning, her desire for a good hunt waning. The lionesses depart without her.

Rhea sits back, watches as the clouds float in and out. The dimming sun colors them a haunting shade of purple before, finally, making way for the stars.

"What a pleasant existence you lead." She doesn't move, let alone deign him with an initial response. "What I wouldn't give to study the sky all day and night."

"You should have never become king then," Rhea says half-heartedly, for once not in the mood for a fight. She peers at him from the corner of her eye, mildly relieved that her escape from Othrys has not left him in a fit of anger.

Instead, his chest rumbles with laughter. "You make a fair point."

The silence settles between them, something Rhea once thought would have been difficult for the both of them. Kronos must take it as a welcoming sign. He takes the seat beside her, lying back in the grass. She does not protest.

Rhea turns her head slightly, looking at him from head to toe. "Those scars," she says. For once, his tunic is sheer silk, exposing the multitude of jagged marks across his flesh to her scrutiny. "Where did you get them?"

He hesitates for a moment, yet another surprise from someone she believed to be so sure of himself. "I was young and foolish and I suffered the consequences."

"More so than now?" Her eyes narrow. "What a feat."

Kronos pauses again, no arrogance on his face as it had been in his many other visits to her. "Do you truly wish to know?"

"If it is something you wish to hide? Absolutely." Rhea rests back on her elbows. "Did one of our brothers beat you to a bloody pulp?"

"Quite the opposite, actually," he chuckles, though it is not his usual laugh. His eyes dull, suddenly a million years away. "I am the youngest of the five brothers by far. They were far too occupied to pay much attention to me."

"Ah yes, thanks to their many centuries warring with each other over a mountain."

"That was Ouranos's doing." His smile melts. "If they were too occupied fighting each other they could not join together to turn on him."

"Then you came along and proved him right," Rhea says.

"I did." He purses his lips. "Perhaps our brothers did have time for me every now and then. When times were peaceful, I travelled at their sides, entertained them with my wit. It did not earn me their enmity when there was war."

"But it also did not earn you their respect," Rhea interjects knowingly. "In that regard, Themis and Mmensyone are much the same."

"Correct. I was powerless – no armies, no lands, no wife to impress upon them." Kronos twirls a blade of grass between his thumb and forefinger. "I found such a life unsatisfying and it was not long before I sought Gaia out and her prophecies from the deep Earth."

"And?" She leans in closer with renewed interest, far from the last time she had mocked him for reciting their mother's prophecies. "What did the whispers tell you?"

He casts her a gaze that she can't quite read. "For all that I seek, I would have to climb the highest peak."

"Mount Othrys?"

"No," he says. "_Gaze upon the world unknown, mounted upon thy father's throne._"

The absurdity hits her in an instant. "You're _mad_."

Kronos can only nod. "The oracle does not lie. The highest peak is no mountain. It is the throne of Ouranos."

A plane of existence most Titans dreamed of visiting, a tangible layer in the uppermost reaches of the atmosphere intertwined with an intangible realm in the bosom of wide-ranging Chaos. Created by their sire alone to be _his alone_.

Rhea glances upwards at the sky, almost as if she can see it. "What was it like?"

"No words could do it justice," he whispers, though the awe is evident in his tone. "I see why he guarded it so jealously. I hardly felt his wind striking my chest nor the push that sent me hurtling through the ether. I was mesmerized by the beauty of it all until the very moment my body shattered against the plains of Thessaly. It was utter agony lying there as every tendon, every bone slowly stitched itself together again. The fact these scars are all that remain is a mercy from Chaos himself."

_Crooked one. _Were she a heartless being, Rhea might have laughed. "Do you regret it?"

"The first time I ever laid eyes on you was from atop that throne." Her heart seizes in her chest. Rhea looks away, thankful that it is dark enough that he cannot see the blush rising to her cheeks. "If it were the only way to see, I would gladly climb and fall again and again."

"A non-existent choice now," she muses. "You are the king."

"And rightfully so," Kronos retorts. "As I said, the oracle does not lie."

Rhea laughs. "And what else do Gaia's prophecies tell you?"

"That our life-threads are tied. That we belong together."

She flinches at his brute honesty. "Is that what all of this is? You, following whispers and fate?"

If the question proves too difficult to answer, Kronos does not show it. "The deal I made with Gaia was for a crown and the girl I saw whilst in the heavens." His shoulder brushes against her own. "I do not need prophecies to tell me what I already saw with my own eyes."

Rhea finally turns her head to look at Kronos. Her heart stutters in her chest at how handsome he looks beneath the starry night, a longing that burns throughout her body and soul.

"And if I told you that you could not have both?" They are close enough that their noses touch. For once, she does not shrink away. "Then which would you choose?"

He kisses her instead of answering. Perhaps it is meant to _be _his answer, yet some part of her finds it to be a meager one. They are not the words she expects, the ones she longs to hear.

_Better Kronos than Ouranos. _

She supposes there is some gentility in him: the way he cradles her face between his hands, the way his tongue explores her mouth with the utmost sincerity.

"Marry me," Kronos whispers against her lips. "Please."

Her entire body runs cold. She opens her eyes and the dream shatters.

"Ask me again." She stares at his lips, traces them with her fingers. "Tomorrow."

"Rhea—"

"Tonight, the answer is no, Kronos," she says, watching the confusion in his eyes flash to hurt and teeter towards anger. "Come back tomorrow."

Rhea worms her way out of his grasp before he can fumble for another response. She runs before he can grab her, before he can convince her – maybe even force her – to stay. She runs straight back to the lion's den, her heart skipping a thousand beats and not from exertion.

Once safe, she allows the tears to fall.

* * *

Rhea spends the next day trying not to think of him, of the heat pooling in her belly. She tries not to think of those promises either, of becoming a queen of the cosmos in which her hand could help to shape the world's very foundation. Nor his softer promises of love.

As the sun starts to set, Rhea very well hopes she's ruined his ego and that he won't come back. _Perhaps he's set his sights on another. Marrying Themis or Mnemosyne would save him the trouble._

A fool's hope – it is not long until she spots the white lion pacing in the distance.

Rhea only sighs. For once, she journeys to meet him halfway.

A mistake, she soon realizes. He approaches her in a foul mood, the impatience oozing from every fiber of his being, stilting any hopes of peaceful conversation. He certainly has not forgotten the night before.

_You are a Titaness, _she reminds herself. _You are a mother to _lions.

In a rare fit of bravery, she sits directly beside him, refusing to let her unease show.

"Marry me," he says with unprecedented directness. In it she sees what Rhea herself never got to see: that part of him with enough nerve to steal his father's crown.

Rhea refuses to let her resolve slip. "No." She lies back in the grass.

A muscle twitches beneath his eye. "Gaia—"

"Promised me to you," she sighs, boredom masking an undercurrent of nerves. "But I am not Gaia and, even if I was, we both know her promises can take ages to fulfill."

His hand curls around her thigh and she glares at how familiar he's become. _Too _familiar. "I would have you sooner rather than later," Kronos muses.

It all hits her in a sudden burst of clarity. Rhea sits up suddenly, disquieting him as her face nears his own, only a breath away.

"Then what's stopping you?" she whispers. A teasing hand presses against his thigh as well.

"Nothing whatsoever," Kronos replies back nonchalantly, using his grip on her leg to haul her forward even more, her chest to his. Another tease. "Except curiosity."

They stare at each other for a small moment before he taps his nose against Rhea's, leaning in… But she turns her head, his lips grazing the side of her face instead. Disappointing to say the least.

Rhea lies back in the bed of grass with the grace of a lioness. Perhaps life out on the plains have hardened her after all. "Go on."

He breathes out of his nose, taking a moment to regain himself. "Why say no?" Kronos asks, voice baring the slightest hints of frustration. "You could be a queen, which no Titaness in their right mind would refuse."

"Point taken," she admits. "Are you asking if I loathe you, hence my refusal?"

"Impossible. I can make anyone love me."

_Why me then? _But she cannot pose that question to him. She cannot bear to hear his answer.

Rhea's face goes blank. She gets up again, but fully this time, attempting to stand. "If it does not offend you, my lord, I must go."

Kronos snatches Rhea by the wrist, jerking her a little. "It does offend. It _always _offends." A dark look clouds over his regal features. "You will stay."

_He will stop at nothing to get what he wants, _Theia had told her. In no moment does she believe it more than this.

"I will not." Rhea carefully pries his fingers away. "Ask me again tomorrow." With his permission or otherwise, the Titaness begins to walk away.

"You will say no," he groans after her with a roll of his eyes.

Perhaps he thinks she will keep on walking, that she won't dignify him with a response. Rhea does.

She peers at him from over her shoulder. "Maybe. Maybe not."

Nightfall comes and goes, and Rhea spends the majority of it holding all of her cubs close. She kisses them on their heads what must be a thousand times. She isn't sure when she will get to see them again, _if _she will see them again.

She leaves before dawn, hours before the hunting party can stir.

Rhea finds Kronos in the same spot that she left him, though she doesn't recall turning him into stone. Though that right there might be the answer to most of her problems.

"Have you come to taunt me?" he retorts.

She shakes her head. "I'll marry you."


	4. Tradition

The baths of Rhea's youth would take place in the cold lake, supplemented by showers beneath mild storms. Otherwise, the tedious task of getting herself wet and scrubbing her skin raw never appealed to her. A Titaness need not bother when she can make the dirt rise up and disappear without a second thought.

This is not the same on Mount Othrys.

A party of nymphs swarms into her chambers by the morning, snatching her from bed and forcing her to journey to the palace's thermae. She has half a mind to disintegrate at least two of them until their supple hands begin to caress olive oil into every inch of flesh. This is more than a simple act of hygiene – this is a _ritual._

Rhea purrs throughout most of it, eye half-closed, a promise on her lips that she will never leave this room. Kronos be damned.

That is until Theia and Phoebe, loud and boisterous, barge in. They clap their hands, inciting the nymphs into another rampage. Rhea is pulled from the thermal waters and escorted once again to her room.

Nearly a hundred gowns shimmer into existence, her sisters ruffling through them all until they find one of the finest silk known to man, glistening gold like the ichor in their veins. Rhea only sighs.

The same nimble fingers wrap her hair into a braided chignon as Phoebe drones on about the ceremonial proceedings, Theia adding in her own advice here and there. Rhea listens to none of it, becoming despondent at the sight of her bound tresses: only free maidens can loosen their hair to the wind, not a care in the world.

She cannot help but mourn. _We aren't married yet and I hate him already_.

The clicking and shutting of a wooden box snaps her back into the present moment.

"This is for you," Phoebe says matter-of-fact, revealing a golden diadem inlaid with sparkling emeralds.

She eyes it warily. "Looks heavy," Rhea murmurs.

"Get used to it." Theia retorts. "By the time Kronos pronounces you queen consort, he shall have a dozen more fashioned for you, each one heavier than the last."

"A dozen," Phoebe snorts. "More like a hundred."

Meant from experience, of course. Rhea had been a young girl at the time of Theia's wedding to Hyperion several decades ago and she remembers it still. There had been no shortage of jewels to attract Theia's attention.

Rhea sighs again, not that Phoebe or Theia notice. They're too busy rounding up the nymphs and shooing them from her quarters. She doesn't realize how much a reprieve the silence offers her until the toilsome beings are gone.

Her eyes sharpen. Rhea studies her new appearance in the polished bronze mirror at her side, poking and prodding at her bound hair. "Kronos scares you," she murmurs, giving voice to a thought that's been on her mind all day.

For a moment, they both seem to freeze in place and Rhea wishes they could stay that way. Her sisters stare at each other, sharing a wordless conversation between the two of them, not that she is surprised.

"Of course, he does. And, if you were smart, he would scare you too," Theia retorts. "You can never forget what he is, what he's done. Never."

Rhea stiffens. She can still see it clear as day, wishing it had all been nothing but a dream. Perhaps Kronos would have taken her that day in the grass, bloodlust driving him like a rabid animal. Instead, he had dragged her and all of their siblings to the sea. The details of that moment she would not forget: the ichor on her brother's tunic, her father's cock being thrown into the ocean for the fish to feast on, her mother's evil and hungry gaze. Then they had crowned him king, resting Ouranos's crown of stars upon his brow.

"I haven't," Rhea whispers as if Kronos can hear them now. "I swore to myself I wouldn't."

Phoebe shudders, as if also drowning in the icy flood of memories. "You said yes to his proposal."

"Was there any other option besides yes?" Her fists clenched. "I could only stall his proposal for so long. Gaia promised me to him and I know he is not as patient as he claims."

"Still, the choice is always there," her eldest sister frowns. Strong-will and unconventional disregard must run deep in their generation. "And we had hoped—"

"I know, Phoebe." She had hoped Kronos would have lost interest. Rhea had hoped for much of the same. "It matters no longer. If he wants me to be his queen then I will be his queen."

And perhaps it won't be such torture. In a way, she is free of Gaia's seclusion from the rest of the world, free to forge her own path despite what Fate – or Kronos – might have in store.

For once, Theia has remained quiet throughout. When she speaks it is hardly a whisper. "Do you love him?"

It's a question Rhea has asked herself for days on end. Though in truth, she cannot be sure what love is supposed to look like, what it means. Her example stems from Ouranos and Gaia alone and Rhea is acutely aware of how their union had ended.

The answer to Theia's question eludes her. At least her sister, full of mercy, does not press; love is irrelevant when it comes to their marriages, a convenience only.

"But it's clear he loves you more," Phoebe muses at last, notes of finality signaling the end of that conversation.

"He loves a pretty face," Rhea snorts. _Nothing more_. He cannot see the Celestial Bronze underneath, the hardness in her veins given to all the sons and daughters of Gaia and Ouranos. But if she must play the role of a blushing bride, so be it.

* * *

Waves the size of mountains crash against the cliff face and the ground quakes beneath her feet. Rhea stands firm, a beacon of gold in her wedding dress stark against the starless night. Wisps of hair have already unraveled free from her braided chignon – perhaps a foreshadowing of how she too is ready to come undone.

"Are you a fan of the sea?"

She glances behind at the young girl standing in her shadow. "It has a certain beauty to it, I suppose. For those enamored by the untamable," Rhea muses. The girl approaches, tucking a lock of dark hair behind her ear. "I'm sorry, I do not believe we have met before."

The girl bows deeply. "I am Metis, daughter of Oceanus and Tethys. I am here on their behalf. It is a great honor to attend this special occasion, my lady."

"The pleasure is mine, Metis," Rhea says rather clumsily. She half-wonders if it will always be like this when she becomes queen. "Your mother and father are not here."

She hesitates. "There were…matters."

Their eyes lock. "They did not want to come."

Metis takes a step back to survey her with stormy gray eyes. "You do not know of the conflict."

She shakes her head. "War? Between Kronos and Oceanus?"

"Skirmishes leading to a stalemate," Metis dismisses, though Rhea cannot tell if it is out of courtesy. "My father is conservative in his wisdom. He did not wish to incur the wrath of Ouranos by joining the rebellion and this did not settle well with your betrothed. He insulted my father by throwing the Sky God's manhood into our oceans, proclaiming us enemies. He has denied me and my brothers and sisters Titanhood – none of us are allowed to enter Othrys or marry outside of Oceanus's domain."

The girl's even tone gives rise to Rhea's curiosity. "Yet you are here as his emissary."

"Kronos extended the invitation," Metis smirks. "Perhaps he realizes just how new his kingdom is. He does not want war – not yet. There are pleasantries that must be upheld. For the most part."

A glimmer of the wily mind behind the easy smile finally puts the Titaness at ease, even as she says, "With relationships so fragile, your father would risk your safety?"

The girl shrugs. "There are a hundred Oceanids, my lady. My father knows this and so does Kronos. What happens to me is of no consequence, for better or worse."

Rhea nods, accepting the matter. She knows there is little she can do to change the state of things, but what she can change… "I will ensure your safety while you are here, Metis."

For a moment, Metis looks taken aback. "That is very kind of you, my lady."

"Very kind indeed," another voice says from behind. They both turn their heads. "She will be a wonderful queen."

Metis bows immediately.

Rhea's expression sours. "Mother."

"Your betrothed has arrived." She glides forward, patting Metis's head. "You best join the others, young one."

The girl says not another word, nodding quickly and dashing out of sight.

Rhea does not miss the spring in her mother's steps. Gaia places a hand on Rhea's shoulder. "I knew eventually you would see reason."

She bristles. "I do this not for you—"

"I know that very well. You're nearly as stubborn as I am." She smirks, the glint in her eyes hinting at a fondness Rhea can't quite place. "Come. Let us put past enmities aside for the time being. This is a momentous occasion that I have not adequately prepared you for."

"An understatement," Rhea retorts.

Gaia's mirth remains unwavering. "Fear not, dear one. I will help you through this night."

They say nothing as they rejoin the gathered Titans. What stuns her into this silence, Rhea cannot say. Whether she truly has nothing to say to her mother beyond indignant screaming or she is reluctant to ruin the sanctity of the moments to come. To be declared wife to the immortal she finds basking in the light of the full moon upon the highest point of the cliff-face.

_Kronos._

Gaia's grip on her arm tightens. Rhea can help but stiffen – though that is perhaps to her mother's approval.

Over the years, the Titan Lord has shown her many faces: the arrogant prince, the brutal warrior never to be deterred, the dreamer guided by purpose and Destiny. But the face he shows her now is the same one she saw on the Phrygian plains beneath the starry night after he'd told the story of how a boy shattered into a million pieces rose up a man. Utterly vulnerable.

Rhea raises an eyebrow. _Afraid I will take to the wind again?_

His eyes narrow in good humor, as if hearing every word. Though it is Atlas's booming voice that stops a smile from rippling across her betrothed's face.

"Here stands your king, Kronos, Crooked One," the young Titan proclaims, parting through the fray to bore his dark eyes straight in Rhea's direction. "He who freed the world from bondage. He who slew the Tyrant. The youngest child of Earth and Sky, Lord of Creation, Master of Time. Who has sought him out?"

"I, Rhea…" Her words trail off, at a loss. Gaia's presence steadies her once again. "Child of Earth and Sky, maiden of the Phrygian plains. I am to be his wife."

"Approach," Kronos murmurs.

Rhea, naturally, hesitates. In the face of her reluctance, her mother leads her towards the edge of the cliff, towards Kronos's waiting hand.

Their fingers touch.

Her heart thunders in her chest.

Gaia snaps and the grass at their feet erupts into flames, trapping the two of them within a circle.

"Breathe," Kronos whispers. Rhea's eyes snap towards him. She releases a breath she hadn't realized she'd been holding. She finds his thumb tracing lightly over her own. "It will be over soon."

That the Titaness knows very well. _And my life will never be the same. _

In Gaia's hands, a bronze knife appears in existence. She runs a finger over the sharpened edge. "Titans," she murmurs and the immortals surrounding them stand at attention. "Tonight, we pay witness to the unification of two souls. Two life-threads intertwining."

She presents Kronos with the knife, an eyebrow lifting, "Shall we see what Fate has in store for them?" Whispers of _yes _are hardly heard over the raging sea.

With a flash of bronze, Kronos splits open his palm with the blade before ushering it towards Rhea. She takes it gingerly, realizing how small her hands are in comparison to his. She appraises the knife, feeling like a child still, before drawing it against her hand. A hiss escapes from between gritted teeth. The knife slips from her bloodied fingers.

Kronos presses his dripping hand against hers. Rhea winces. Together, they watch their ichor ebb and mix. A shimmering droplet plunges into the flames. Followed by another. And then another. In their wake, a faint silver smoke rises up.

Gaia steps closer to inhale it. Then the convulsions begin.

Many times, Rhea has witnessed the oracle taking root inside of Gaia. Though her curling stomach proves that her unease has not settled with time.

The earth goddess digs her nails into the palm of her hand, drawing forth streams of ichor. All Rhea can hear is the grinding of Gaia's teeth before her eyes snap open, the convulsions ceasing with frightening speed.

_"Children."_

The familiar voice causes a ripple through the crowd as the Titans realize Gaia is not the one who stares back.

Kronos whips out his hand and his scythe materializes from thin air. "You," he seethes.

"Wait!" Without thinking, Rhea grabs his wrist. Their father's breathy laugh echoes from Gaia's own mouth. "This is not Ouranos. This is mother still."

_"No, by all means, child," _says the intruder._ "Strike down Gaia in your anger. It is no less than she deserves."_

"I killed you." Kronos spits at Gaia's feet. "Seems you cannot tell when you are not wanted, Ouranos."

Ouranos leers at them still with that sharp, toothy smile. _"You never listened, did you? You never bothered to think upon the words I left you with."_

The Titan Lord bristles. "The words of a dying man are of no consequence to me."

_"Do you think you are immune to curses? Shall I make it clear for your new wife?"_

His fists clench. "Gaia…"

_"Gaia is not here, Crooked One. But even she has known all this time, from the very first moment she whispered of rebellion,"_ he retorts._ "My children rose up to depose me, as I always knew they would. So then shall you suffer the same Fate."_

Rhea holds her head high. "You cannot frighten us, Father. You are nothing."

Appraising Rhea through Gaia's face, her skin still crawls beneath Ouranos's gaze. She has not forgotten their first meeting all those years ago. _"Remember, sweet Rhea. Those who stood by him are doomed to fall with him."_

Kronos touches her shoulder. "Don't listen to him. He lies."

_"Do I?"_ He laughs, and laughs, and laughs. Until his voice turns light and airy, fading like the wind.

The blue light that filled Gaia's eyes fades as well until she holds oh so very still. Rhea can sense the fatigue creeping up on her mother, but Gaia does not collapse. She waits.

All of them do.

For Kronos.

Stone-faced, his golden eyes bore into Rhea's in a silent message that she cannot read. Not now when her nerves are so frayed.

He turns to the gathered Titans instead, a dark smile gracing his features.

"Look at you all," he scoffs. "Shivering like leaves in the wind. Ouranos is no master of Fate and yet he has led you all to believe it. I am not one to let the curses of a dead god frighten me."

Jaws clench in unison. Titan-spawn as weak? Unheard of.

"Our brother is right," Iapetus affirms. "We slew Ouranos so he could rule us no longer. No empty curse can change that."

Kronos bows his head in thanks. "Let fear of Ouranos die with him."

"And may Chaos swallow his soul!" Hyperion intones, a chant quickly repeated by all of them.

Gaia nods in gentle approval but looks to Rhea now as she speaks. "Tonight, our lord has proven himself worthy of a wife. And in more ways than one."

Again, the Titans cheer, the memory of Ouranos once again forgotten. Rhea steels herself: she too is Titan-spawn, queen now. _Let fear of Ouranos die with him. _

"But," Gaia continues, her eyes narrowing, "as old customs dictate, if you want a bride, you must catch her."

"What?" Rhea has enough time to utter before her sisters descend upon her like vultures. They pull her away from Kronos's side, giggling and squealing.

Her eyes never leave her mother's face.

Gaia steps towards her, resting a hand on Rhea's cheek. "It's time to run, my little lion. I suggest you discard those heavy jewels 'less they slow you down."

"Mother, you can't be ser—"

Gaia grins, snatching the weighty medallion from her chest. "Have fun, Rhea. Remember that there is still a palace to trek to. Don't make the chase too hard on him."

She disappears into the fray and Theia comes to take her place. "Run far and run fast, sister. Try to look just a little terrified. Otherwise, we'll all just have to assume you gave into Kronos's advances long before this night."

Phoebe pushes her down the slope.

Rhea doesn't recall telling her feet to move – she has hardly thought about anything after Ouranos's intrusion and this surprise has not exactly bettered her trail of thought – only that gravity works in mysterious ways and she somehow finds her way through a set of wooded hills.

From there, instincts take over.

_If you want a bride, you must catch her._

She has never been preyed upon before, and in a way, she finds it exhilarating. Rhea stamps her feet into the ground, propelling her body forward. She discards the himation across her shoulders, letting it float behind her off into the windy night.

And, allowing herself to listen closer, Rhea swears she can hear a thunderous pursuit. A peal of laughter escapes her. She runs faster.

The elevation plateaus and the trees thin. She hears the roaring river before she can see it. With no more than a thought, Rhea could scale it in one leap, continuing on her trek. Only her mother's words and a sudden, invisible grip keep her from doing so.

Like wading through mercury, Rhea turns around slowly, unsurprised to come face-to-face with the panting Kronos.

"I didn't think my bride would give me such chase." Rhea does not fail to miss the playful twinkle in his eyes.

"Cheater," she hisses, surprised at how feral she sounds. Not afraid, as any sane person would be given that she has never seen his abilities in action before. "_If you want a bride you must catch her._"

The invisible hold fades but his humor does not. "Apologies. Now that you are in arms reach it seems I am hesitant to let you go."

Rhea flashes him a wanton smirk, taking a step forward. "Then you're a bigger fool than I first took you for."

For one step forward, Kronos makes her take at least three back as he pins her against the nearest tree trunk. She doesn't miss the nimble fingers grazing at her hips. "What am I to do with such a quick-witted wife?"

Her eyes narrow. She leans further into him, brushing her lips against his own. "Why, you would do best to silence her, my lord."

Kronos needs no further goading. He captures her mouth in a kiss that steals her breath away and she can't find it in her heart to protest. Not when she finds the same heart beating wildly beneath her ribs, reminiscent of that _other_ night they once shared together. Though a passion long kept under lock and key, Rhea now sets it free. If Kronos is surprised by the ferocity in which Rhea kisses him back, he does not let on.

Never one to keep his hands to himself, they roam without restraint. Deft fingers slip beneath the hem of her dress and find their way to shaking thighs.

"You're so cold," he murmurs against her lips. "We should fix that."

Rhea doesn't have time to respond. He cups her ass, squeezing hard enough to lift her up. She squeals.

Her husband seems all too pleased with himself and takes to undoing the laces of her dress. More kisses trail down her neck and, true and said, she finds a nauseating heat rising from her stomach.

Kronos strips her bare – in more ways than one. The stroke of confidence she felt at the beginning of this courtship quickly fades. Rhea shudders as she pushes him away finally, the blush in her cheeks all-consuming. The shy maiden within rises once more. "There is a palace we must trek back to, husband."

"No," he growls, sending a thrum of pleasure down her spine. "I will take you here where the moon shines. Where the world will see that you are mine."

Rhea pauses. She cannot say _why _such a thing sounds so appealing. Even under the weight of a crown, perhaps her heart still belongs to the wilderness and such a proposition still allows it to sing.

She gives him a simple nod.

Kronos captures her lips again. His hands drop to her hips, prying pins loose from the fabric of her dress. Bunched at her waist, it is not long until he allows it to fall to the ground forgotten.

He pulls away breathing heavily, resting his forehead against her own. "Tell me what you're thinking," Kronos whispers.

The back of her hand brushes the pulsing vein in his neck. Perhaps, beneath the moonlight, he is just as flushed as she is. "I'm thinking about how I want you to touch me."

Kronos chuckles deep in his chest, providing ample kindling for the fire erupting in her belly. "We could always start here." His hand presses firm against the inside of her thigh. Rhea shudders. "Do let me know when I'm close."

But Rhea already knows her help is unnecessary. His phantom fingers climb higher, seeking warmth.

"There," she moans still, and he obliges, rubbing in slow, torturous circles that might just cause her to combust. The ache between her legs has never been so unbearable. She rocks against his hand, eager for a release. Much like a wave building on the tide, ready to come crashing against the shore.

For a moment, she's so preoccupied with Kronos's ministrations she almost misses a chill on the back of her neck. A sure sign of them being watched.

"Stop." Her arms snap back to cover her breasts from view. "They're here."

Kronos withdraws though his gaze hardly strays from hers. He feels it too – the eyes scrutinizing their every move. "It seems they've come to watch."

That isn't to her surprise. The Titans are entitled to a consummation ceremony of the newlyweds, though Rhea sincerely doubts they had planned to watch from the middle of the woods.

A slow smile breaks across his face and, with his pupils blown wide, he looks positively feline. "Do we plan to give them a show?"

_I will take you here where the moon shines. Where the world will see that you are mine. _A literal declaration then. For the hundredth time this night, she blushes and says nothing.

"They aren't really here. It is only us still." Kronos pauses for a moment, drinking her in. "You don't have to hide from me."

"Don't I?" Rhea quips, a frown forming on her lips. "If you have me wet and willing or screaming and with my face in the dirt, it matters not. The outcome is the same."

His brows furrow. "It isn't. I would have never waited for you to say yes if that were the case."

If only Rhea can make him see that that had never been a real choice. At the end of the day, those who have been told their fate become slaves to it. This marriage was inevitable and she can no longer delude herself into thinking otherwise.

But a choice has been laid out in front of her. She can say no to him now, redress and make the trip back to Mount Othrys with the rest of the Titans in toe. Though from then on, she will no longer be allowed to run free through the plains. As queen, her allegiance is to Kronos and his vision of a world order, her wants now nonexistent.

Or she can be true to herself just this once, however brief. She can show him and the rest what sort of metal their new queen is made of.

Rhea lowers her arms and reaches out to rip away the gilded belt resting on his hips. Kronos doesn't touch her, only watches as the tunic falls. His erection now revealed, her face burns hotter than Hyperion's armor. But she refuses to look anywhere else but his eyes, where she finds his mischievous glint has returned.

"If you're expecting me to ogle you, think again. I have more pride than any wayward nymph you've come across," Rhea tells him, though she takes in the cut of his body in her peripheral vision. For a moment, she can understand Ouranos's obsession with perfection given all that their father created.

"I expect nothing," Kronos lies, finally taking her into his arms once more.

He lays her down upon the forest floor like a ripe sacrifice for the cruel gods that came before them. She takes in the dirt beneath her skin, the leaves caressing her hands, and how _right _it feels to be close to their mother's embrace rather than a palace piercing the ether…

Yet fear flashes in her eyes. It doesn't escape Kronos's note and she knows what he must be thinking: _The maiden of the Phrygian plains, a true maiden after all. _

The next kiss on her lips is the sweetest of them all. Rhea glares nevertheless; she is not a hapless babe and if he intends to treat her as such then her first act as queen will be to hurl him off of Mount Othrys.

Kronos only smiles, brushing his knuckles against her cheek. Her expression softens beneath his touch. No matter how brash and arrogant her husband can be, at least she has the privilege of seeing this side of him, especially on tonight of all nights.

With little ceremony to be had, he nestles himself between her thighs. His erection gathered in one hand, he guides himself to her entrance.

Her quivering fingers trace the scars on his chest. _The first time I ever laid eyes on you was from atop that throne. If it were the only way to see, I would gladly climb and fall again and again._

Kronos slips inside of her a moment later with a gasp on his lips. His lashes flutter, his breaths barely restrained.

She watches him in silence, focusing on her body to remain still yet pliant. Her face pinches the deeper he goes until Rhea can no longer take it. "Wait," she whispers finally.

Kronos freezes, eyes wide and probing her expression. "What is it? What's wrong?"

She struggles to say something, anything… but, in this moment, Rhea finds it easier to show him.

Without warning, her hands push against his chest. In his shock, Kronos moves far more readily than she anticipated and Rhea presses her advantage, a lioness making her kill. Though with Kronos, there is hardly a struggle. She traps his waist between her thighs, pinning his arms beneath her.

Rhea senses the whole world inhaling, holding its breath. Not even a day as a wife and she has already broken her first law, though her husband makes no move to reprimand her. Kronos's mouth hangs open but no words come forth. She takes that opportunity to stroke the hardness brushing against her thigh and he shudders.

"It matters not what women you have been with before," Rhea declares before him. "I am not them."

He closes his eyes, voice straggled, "No, you are not." She has proven that well enough.

She persists still. "I am your queen."

When Rhea takes him between her legs again, she is the catalyst, the one who leads. Their union still brings her discomfort but the Titaness forces herself to take it in stride this time. _I am the blood of Earth and Sky. _She has felt pain before, the kind that scars the soul. Tearing apart her maidenhood is nothing in comparison.

Rhea smells Gaia's approval in the air. This time she does not feel fear or apprehension. She only feels power.

"You are my queen," Kronos answers finally, still straining to hold onto some shred of control. When their eyes lock, Rhea swears she sees only reverence.

She pushes herself to the hilt, smothering the cry threatening to escape her lips. "You are mine." The words remain heavy on her tongue as if uttering a spell.

"I am yours," Kronos agrees readily. His hands grab onto her waist, sending little shocks firing up and down her spine. He leans forward and Rhea finds his lips a breath away from her own. "Completely and utterly yours."

As he thrusts into her, causing Rhea to elicit a groan she didn't think herself capable of, she prays it isn't a lie. But to the dozens of eyes boring holes into her back, Rhea can only smile.


	5. Hearth

The days of bliss blur together. Perhaps it is too easy when most of those first few days are spent in their new chambers the moment they cross into the palace's threshold.

Day and night, Rhea explores him anew, eager to chip away at his rough exterior and uncover the same vulnerability she glimpsed beneath the stars. In return, Rhea thinks he steals a part of her soul every time she lies with him, for he has seen parts of Rhea that she has shown to no one else before nor will she show ever again.

The novelty of sex, however, can only last so long. Especially when there are unbidden questions that come to mind, desperate to be answered.

"Do you think what Ouranos said was true?"

Even the candles dim at the mention of his name, a lingering curse they can never shake even in their thickest haze.

The question draws out Kronos's head nestled in the crook of her neck. He shoots her a glance somewhere between mildly amused and wary. "Father, even in death, enjoys bluffing." His arms around her waist tighten. "You should know that better than anyone. His many threats to throw the lot of us into Tartarus were boundless and yet here we all are."

She only sighs, pressing closer against him. Rhea has spent so long with Kronos now, the two of them intertwined, that she can hardly imagine a time when they were apart.

"He doesn't deserve your attention, love," he whispers against her jaw, teeth aching to scrape against her skin, devour her whole. "You are my queen now. Banish all thoughts of him."

The Titaness grins, murmuring something along the lines of, "I like the sound of that."

_I am your queen. _She declared as much to the entire pantheon – to the entire world – and he had wholeheartedly agreed. Green eyes meet gold. "You never did tell me what made you say yes."

Her heart nearly stops. "That depends." Rhea lifts her head, balancing it on a propped elbow. "Do you want the truth?" _Because that is the one thing I cannot give you. _

He pauses, perhaps reading the indecision carefully hidden behind her nonchalant mask. "With all the times I was rebuffed, I doubt you could bruise my ego anymore."

_Half-truths it is then. _"Then I'm not sure."

As she expected, Kronos groans in indignation. "Come now, Rhea…"

"You speak of Fate, which I can only fight against for so long if it is true," she retorts as a quick excuse, her mind whirling. "And then there's you, so stubborn once your mind is set. I would have an easier time herding lions across the ocean." Rhea smiles lazily. "Perhaps I was tired?"

"Tired of me?" Kronos probes. "Gaia? The idyllic life of a peculiar shepherd?"

"Maybe," Rhea answers with little clarification.

"You are insufferable."

Her eyes narrow in amusement. "And sadly, you are stuck with me forever. If I were king of the cosmos, I would have done more vetting."

She purses her lips though, knowing half-truths and vague words will do nothing to placate his curiosity, wily being that he is and always will be. Rhea searches her mercurial heart to the best of her ability in search of an answer that would satisfy him.

When Rhea does, she grows somber at the thought. "Theia, Phoebe, they would visit mother often."

He snorts. "A flock of hens."

"Yes. Wherever they go, their brood follows." The bitterness in her voice hasn't been conjured for his sake. "Their children are… so innocent and lovely. Their marriages are far from perfect – Koios and Hyperion are not easy men to love – but they've found happiness in the life that they've created. They… I would be a liar if I said that I didn't envy them from time to time."

For a long moment, Kronos does not speak. "And that is why you think of Ouranos." His jaw tightens. "His words frighten you."

"Do they not frighten you?"

His gaze softens. "We have each other, Rhea. If Ouranos had his way, I would have been cast out by the other Titans – driven to madness by the isolation. But he was wrong. I am at the brink of ushering a new world order with you at my side." A blush rises to her cheeks – she still has not given full thought to the weight of her new title. "I say let the fear of Ouranos die with him. Let us start our new life free of his shadow."

Her resulting smile is bittersweet. "With that silver tongue of yours, you could make Chaos seem as small and insignificant as a blade of grass."

"But a silver tongue will not wipe away your worries completely," he sighs. "Only trust can do that, which takes time."

_Perhaps he is not entirely ignorant. _"Time. Everything is always a matter of time with you." She smirks. "How depressing."

"Should I tell you of lighter things then?"

Rhea almost sighs in relief, grateful for the change in subject. "Depending on what they are."

"I asked a favor from the Cyclopes building our palace. We will spend most of our time on Mount Othrys and godsforbid we keep a wild beast from its natural habitat." Rhea climbs off their bed but she is careful not to let her stare break away from his. "A sanctuary is being constructed for your eyes only, should you ever wish to return to your days of frolicking and flower picking."

Rhea bites her lip, trying to keep herself from grinning. "And there's a pond?"

"The exact same one," he muses. "They will get the details just right."

"Will they?" She lifts herself from the bed, knowing he doesn't miss the spring in her step. "What kind of flowers?"

Kronos raises an eyebrow. "If I told you it would spoil the surprise."

"Another way to say, _I don't know?_" Rhea pours herself another goblet of nectar.

Kronos naturally gravitates towards her with an impish grin that reflects his age: too young, younger than Rhea herself.

She takes a sip and Kronos takes his chance, pressing his fingers to the bottom of the chalice and tilting it up. Rhea flinches when the nectar flows past her lips and down her chin. Her hand covers her mouth immediately and they both stare at the drops that hit her bare chest.

"Bastard." She wipes the golden liquid from her lips.

Kronos gathers her in his arms, unable to hide his amusement. Experimentally, he kisses the valley between her breasts. The nectar smears.

Rhea only sighs. All thoughts of Ouranos, curses, and Fate quickly drift off into the abyss, forgotten. She straddles his waist, holding him close as Kronos's hands once again find their way to her thighs. Around them, between them.

He smiles again, devious as always.

* * *

When she was a child, Rhea feared the dark. The creatures who roam in it – Erebus, Nyx… _Tartarus_ – were never friends to the progeny of Earth and Sky, born in a time where Chaos ruled supreme.

Her first time on Othrys, now queen of the cosmos, the dark is apparent. But given she had spent most of her life thus far on the Phrygian plains, of course any grand enclosure might seem little more than a tomb.

Rhea hardens herself against such longing. _This _is her home now and she must make do. But with this realization comes another, in which dark places need not be cold or frightening. Sometimes – with effort, of course – she can think back to the times she was but a sentient candle burning bright in her mother's womb. The warmth that nurtured her, kept her safe, prepared her for a life as Fate's puppet.

_We need fire, _she tells Kronos, and as always, he obeys.

She plants her hearth in the center of the sprawling complex, carefully positioned far away from the dreaded throne room meant to be imposing to his enemy's emissaries. _His domain_, she calls it, while hers is far more welcoming.

"GET OUT!"

The mountain quakes beneath his roar but she has long learned to ignore Kronos's explosive bouts of rage.

She prods at the flames of her budding hearth, casting a glare at young Metis in the corner who seems a hair away from chewing off her nails. "Quickly now. Before he gets away."

The girl flees the room and Rhea reclines on her makeshift throne – little more than elegant cushions and a far cry from her imposing onyx beast resting in the throne room.

It is not long before she hears padding footsteps and frantic hushed whispers. Metis and man at her side bow once coming into her view.

Rhea sits up a little straighter. "Brother Nereus. It is so good to see you." Metis takes a seat on the floor by her side. "You do not intend to leave so soon, do you?"

The Primordial snaps back up, his spine as rigid as tree bark. Sea blue eyes are filled to the brim with stormy rage. "Your husband has insulted me for the last time—"

"But you do _me_ ill if you mean to leave without joining me for dinner." She flashes a dazzling smile. "You wouldn't offend the queen of Mount Othrys in such a way, would you?"

Where Kronos is fire, so quick to anger, she is the soothing balm for the burn – calm and collected. But it is a mistake to think that their traits have not rubbed off on one another.

He hesitates. "Kronos—"

"Will never change his ways," Rhea interjects. "A bull can never become a butterfly, you understand?"

Her half-brother nods reluctantly. If anything, Gaia's stubborn nature has certainly rubbed off on him.

She smoothes out the wrinkles in her skirt. "I want my children to grow up in a world where they will be safe, brother. That cannot be so if land and sea are at each other's throats. For their sake, tell me what it will take to have this ceasefire enacted?"

Nereus raises an eyebrow. She watches as he notes the hearth in between them. He takes a precarious step forward, still so _stiff _despite the rumors Rhea had heard of sea deities being so lax. "Is it proper to do business with the likes of—?"

Her impatience cuts like a newly sharpened sword. "Metis, a summary?"

"Disputes over territory, my lady." She places a hand on the queen's knee. "Lord Oceanus has undisputable control of the waters encircling our territory, as was his birthright following Pontus's abdication. However, the inland waters have not yet been spoken for."

Rhea attempts to hide her snort. "Oceanus and my husband fight over creeks and streams?"

"It is those very creeks and streams that fuel the agriculture your worshippers depend on, my lady." Nereus's eyes narrow. "It would be best not to overlook them."

She tilts her head towards him. "Forgive me, brother. You are right."

"Kronos requests dominion over the water spirits since they are in his territory," Metis continues. "Many of them, however, are sons and daughters of Oceanus and would rather owe loyalty to their father."

"And what would be your suggestion for a resolution?"

"As I was explaining to your husband—"

A hiss from her lips stops him short. "My question was directed to Metis, my lord." Her lips purse. Forgive me," Rhea adds, though the words ring hollow.

A bead of sweat erupts about Metis's eyebrow. "I have no right to preside on such matters, lady."

The insolent Nereus continues, much to Rhea's chagrin. "The girl is correct. These are the affairs of men—"

"Are you not a daughter of Oceanus?" the queen snaps.

"Yes."

"And are we not deciding the fates of your brothers and sisters?" A moment of quiet ensues before Rhea presses on once more. "Then if you were put into this position, caught between the world of your father and the world of your rightful king, what would you do?"

The silver eyes of Metis flicker back and forth between Rhea and Nereus. For a moment, the old sea god relaxes, perhaps thinking his point made. Until the girl blurts out, "Pay tribute."

He looks to her, incredulous. "Excuse me?"

"The laws of the universe dictate that we must respect our fathers in all things. To disrupt such a bond is to tempt fate and welcome disorder. Thus, the progeny of Oceanus should remain under his dominion. In this, I agree with you, uncle." Rhea places a hand over her own. "However, with our territory being split between the two brothers, we have no right to Kronos's territory unless we show him the respect he is owed as the lord of these lands. The Oceanids and the Potamoi should bestow a necessary tribute, to be decided by Kronos and collected by his four Titan brothers, in order to preserve the terms of ceasefire."

Rhea gives Metis's fingers a gentle squeeze, hoping it will convey just how proud she is of her in this moment. "Nereus," she says, "will our brother agree to these terms?"

His lips fix into a thin line. "Will _Kronos?_"

She snorts. "I make no promises but a wife knows the ways in which her husband can be persuaded." Rhea ignores the color that rises to their cheeks. "Will you take these terms to Oceanus?"

He grimaces. "Yes, my lady. Though I cannot say if he will agree to them."

"That is as much as I can hope for at this moment in time." Rhea closes her eyes briefly. "Thank you, Nereus. Will you be staying with us this night?"

The god drops into another bow, still stiffer than the last. "No, my lady. I think it best to take my leave."

"Fine," Rhea dismisses, "so long as you do your job and leave me to mine."

She watches Nereus go. A heartbeat later, Metis rises from the floor to follow him out the door. Rhea's voice stops her. "Metis."

The girl slips a fearful glance over her shoulder. "Yes, my lady?"

"I enjoy having you as a handmaiden but it has come to my attention you are ill-suited for the task."

She falls to her knees, palms splayed across the floor. "My lady, I am sorry if I offe—"

"From now on, you will be my personal advisor, to help me in these matters when they arise."

The girl blinks for several moments, as if unable to comprehend at first. "You are too kind, Lady Rhea. Truly."

She tilts her head in thanks. "See that Nereus finds his way out. I will take care of Kronos personally."

* * *

An hour into the _thermae_, Kronos finally comes to her, slamming the door behind him. He finds Rhea with her head resting against her arms, while the rest of her body remains submerged beneath the temperate bathwater.

Lazily, she cracks open an eye. "Rough day?"

He snorts. "Let us not talk of kingly affairs." He slips out of his tunic, though without taking his eyes off her. "You are the one thing that has been on my mind all day."

She chuckles, watching him approach the water's edge. "I do more than wait for you to bed me in the night, fool. You do realize that?"

"Yes, of course," Kronos mocks. He sinks into the waters with a content hiss upon his lips.

Still, Rhea keeps her distance, studying him with earnest intent. "I heard of your troubles with Nereus."

As expected, his loving façade drops. "You spoke with him?" He scowls. "Why?"

"You aren't subtle when your yell can be heard from across the mountain, love." She smirks, finally padding over to him and wrapping her arms around his waist. "But yes, I did."

"And what did the slimy bastard say?" Her fingers brush against his clenched jaw. "Did he speak of more ways to cheat me?"

"He hardly spoke," she muses.

For once he does not soften under her touch, though she refuses to let it unnerve her. "Ah, so your leaden tongue is just as quick with other men, I take it?"

Rhea scoffs. "Are you jealous?"

Kronos traces the ridge of her collarbone. "Do I have cause to be?"

She rolls her eyes. "Metis was with me and thank Chaos for that. She came up with a brilliant solution I think you would find agreeable."

His suspicion eases. "Go on…"

A peal of laughter escapes her lips. "How would you like to become richer?"

His hands cup her face. A smile tugs at the corner of his lips – just the opening she had pressed for. "You certainly have a way of catching my attention, little lion."

"Let the Oceanids and Potamoi declare for their father." Anger flashes across his face, but Rhea continues anyway, so use to his mercurial moods. "So that when you tax them, there will be no hard feelings."

Kronos considers her for a moment. "What could insignificant water spirits offer me?"

"Even you are aware of the riches to be found in streams and lakes, dearest one." She dares a peck on his lips. "You need only request it in return, should they wish to avoid your infamous wrath."

He breaks apart from her, shaking his head slowly as if to clear it. Kronos climbs out of the water, sitting on the pool's ledge. "And let Oceanus win?" he grumbles.

Rhea purses her lips. She stands to her full height, treading water to reach him. "You are king of Earth and Sky." His half-hidden erection doesn't escape her note, bringing a smirk to Rhea's face instead. "While Oceanus is but another ruler of the sea." Her hand comes to rest against his knee. She finds it easy to part his legs and nestle herself between them. "You need not antagonize each other further. Time to leave him forgotten in the depths where he belongs."

"Sweet Rhea with her sweet words." Kronos scoffs, though it has since lost any sense of derision. He broods for a moment – so characteristic of this Titan Lord – as he lays thoughtful strokes against Rhea's shoulder. "I should thank that girl of yours. She was certainly a worthy investment."

"I already did. A promotion." Rhea dares another kiss, this time on the top of his thigh. "Now let me thank _you_. For agreeing to this scheme."

She expects him to sneer, to tell her that he hasn't agreed to anything. Instead, Kronos brushes his fingers through her hair. "What did I do to deserve such a beautiful yet _devious _woman?"

* * *

As lady of Mount Othrys, when the ceasefire is ratified, she is the one who makes plans for a grand celebration. Though, true to her word, she finds it an impossible feat without Metis. The Oceanid marches across Othrys with a general's authority, barking orders to her army of nymphs in order to ensure all proper preparations are in place. Braziers lit. Tables set. Floors polished. And Rhea beams at Metis throughout it all, much like a proud mother.

When the Titans gather, Rhea greets them in a gown that shimmers as blue as the Mediterranean. Metis herself had strung pearls through the Titaness's hair as a small taste for what their future will hold.

By the time she finds her sisters in the fray of partygoers, Theia and Phoebe have decimated the stores of fermented nectar. As if nothing has changed, they encourage Rhea to drink her own fill as well before bombarding her with details of their sexual escapades. Rhea blushes throughout all of it. And Theia, whose head often floats among the clouds, stares at the queen with her undivided attention. "Marriage suits you," she smiles, always with a gaze that suggests she knows more than she lets on.

But before the Titaness can press her sister further, they're swept into a larger group with Themis, Mmnesyone, and other minor Titans.

They drink to her husband's success with Oceanus. Though it was _her _meddling that cemented peace, Rhea knows very well that the role of queen will always be a thankless one and such a conversation does not bother her as much as she thought it would. For her success is Kronos's success and vice versa.

_This is what it means to be a married woman. _

True to fashion, Kronos enters the chamber to cheering and thunderous applause. His gaze cuts through the crowd to find Rhea. She smiles coyly, taking another sip of nectar.

Hyperion passes the Titan Lord his own goblet. "To Kronos!"

The Titans thrust their cups into the air. "To Kronos!"

Always his herald, Atlas prattles off the titles Rhea once heard at her wedding. _Crooked One. He who freed the world from bondage. He who slew the Tyrant. The youngest child of Earth and Sky. Lord of Creation. Master of Time._

Now _peacemaker_.

"I have ushered in a Golden Age, brethren," Kronos muses, clapping his brothers on their backs. "But it would be unjust for me to take all the credit. Instead, we toast to our queen, nearest and dearest to my heart."

She can hardly believe his words, now drowned out by another round of applause. From across the room, their eyes lock, and Kronos raises his goblet in her direction. In this moment, Rhea swears she feels true happiness.

Though this moment pales in comparison to the fluttering inside her belly.

* * *

The special light overwhelms her as a single spark that soon multiplies into a dozen. Then a hundred. And then a thousand. Something so strange, so beautiful – Rhea knows what this is before even Gaia, goddess of the oracle and every prophecy whispered from the deep cracks in the earth, can tell her.

"I will be a mother soon," she whispers to her own mother – the first person she tells – in a sacred grove just outside the shadow of Mount Othrys. Even such words can hardly contain her awe, her hope, in revealing this truth.

"It was only a matter of time," Gaia sighs in a tone that seems almost like dismissal. Her gaze does not waver from the mountains lying in the horizon. "You are closer to the earth than any of your other sisters. Your fertility knows no bounds."

Rhea tries to hide her disappointment, though she can't be sure what she expected from Gaia. Words of approval? A loving embrace? Her hand drifts to her belly, seeking comfort in the life swelling beneath her fingertips. "You make it sound like a disease."

Gaia's hand comes to rest on her shoulder. "Our gifts come with their fair share of good and bad." The goddess finally looks to her and Rhea finds her eyes to be more guarded than usual. "Yours, it seems, have grown exponentially."

"What does that mean?"

"Only time will tell." All the confirmation Rhea needs that her mother is hiding something. "Have you informed Kronos?"

"No," she admits. "I wanted to be sure."

Gaia stares at her for a long moment. With every passing second, Rhea's nausea seems to rise. "You were already sure." Her lips settle into a firm line. "Are you afraid?"

Such careful wording gives the queen pause. "Do I have cause to be?"

"That all depends," Gaia says, "on how much you trust him."

_I trust no one, _Rhea must tell herself in the many months she dwells on this secret. _It has nothing to do with Kronos. _

Naturally, she blames her mother for this development and not just for the conservation they shared in the grove – but as a side effect of Rhea's entire upbringing. She had forever grown up in the shadow of a mother who had endured the Beginning, who understood what it meant to love and trust and hate and hurt.

_But Gaia isn't here. _

She nearly tells him half a hundred times in the stolen moments they spend in Rhea's sanctuary or before their heated exchanges in the thermae. Worse still are the nights she shares his bed, wishing she could break the dam withholding the flood of words so desperate to be released.

But an unknown worry holds her back every time.

Rhea sighs, resting her aching back against her swarm of cushions. Even if Kronos doesn't notice, Rhea _does. _The slight stretch of her belly, her breasts growing round and heavy.

Again, Rhea stokes the flames to her hearth, now muted and dull. _A warning, perhaps, _she muses. A family cannot thrive on a mountain of secrets.

_No more games, _she decides. _I must tell him the next time I see him. _

But perhaps Fate has a cruel way of playing tricks on her. It is not long before she hears his footfall down the hall, making his way towards her.

Her blood chills when his face comes into view.

"There you are." Kronos throws himself down on the cushions beside her. "It's late."

Rhea shrugs. "We don't sleep. The time of the day is of little importance."

"All the same," Kronos pulls her closer, "I missed you."

"I have surely wrapped you around my finger then," she muses, nuzzling his chest. "A few hours gone and you come searching like a lost cub."

"Can you blame me?"

His fingers stroke her cheek. _You're a fool, _Rhea chides herself. _A godsforsaken fool._

Kronos lays a kiss against her lips, innocent enough. But this Titaness knows better. This is the calm before the storm, for his second kiss is searing. Always filled with the insatiable hunger of a starving man. Her bottom lip catches in his teeth and she can't help the whimper that escapes her. Kronos rears like a wolf that's caught onto the scent.

He covers her body with his own. Wanton hands roam freely, pawing at her breasts until Rhea finds herself careening into him. The heat he draws out of her is sudden and blinding.

Until Kronos's hand skims against her stomach.

She breaks away from him, gasping.

"What's wrong?" Kronos asks her, tongue swiping over bruised lips.

Briefly, Rhea wishes she could freeze time right here and burn this moment into her mind forever: blushing faces, tasseled hair, loose tunics slipping from their shoulders.

"I think…" _Come out with it. Enough is enough. _"I'm with child, Kronos."

For a moment she only hears wood crackling beneath the strain of the flames. "You're…" His eyebrows furrow. "You're sure?"

Her mind reels. "I went to Gaia. She told me it was true," Rhea lies. She groans on the inside, but a small lie such as this one is much easier to reveal than one hiding something of such importance.

"Sweet Chaos," Kronos whispers, for a moment at a loss for words. "Do you know what… it will be?"

_Does it matter?_ She rubs a hand against her burning cheeks, sighing, "No, not for sure."

"Hopefully it's a girl." Perhaps he sees her resulting face that he feels the need to add, "Isn't that what most mothers hope for?"

Rhea frowns. "And wouldn't most fathers hope for a son?"

"I suppose." A shadow passes over his face. "Then again, I'm the Titan that killed his own father. I don't deserve to be content. But you do."

"Kronos," she whispers, a spike of guilt rising in her. She has long thought the worst of all the men in her life but she has no right to question his intentions now.

Rhea finally allows herself to bask in his embrace. It won't be long now until she cradles this babe in her arms and she has him to thank for that. She captures his lips in a celebratory kiss.

"I love you," Kronos murmurs, flushed against her skin. And in that moment, it is easy for her to miss that sparkle of doubt in his eyes. And it is equally as easy for Kronos to forget that she does not say _I love you _in return.

But she must love him, at least, for this sweet joy he has given her.

* * *

Rhea arrives in the heavens out of breath, swearing this will be the last time she indulges in answering favors whilst _this _pregnant.

"Come quickly, mistress," she hears before hardly opening her eyes. Lord Aether of the heavens stands before her in all his shining radiance, but not for long. He turns on his heel, rushing down the hall with the expectation that Rhea follow him. "Hyperion will make his approach soon, Hemera with him. Nyx must be in the Underworld by then or we fear throwing off the cycle."

Though she has always loved Aether's sunny demeanor since she was a child, it takes all of Rhea's willpower not to incinerate him on the spot. "It is in Kronos's best interest that this does not happen, but please my lord Aether. Take pity on an expecting mother?"

The Primordial realizes his mistake. "Of course, my lady, of course. Forgive me." He returns to her side, wrapping an arm around her waist. "Goodness, I remember when you were a babe yourself, so full of energy. Look at how the time passes. You are also quite far along."

Rhea clears her throat as they continue their brisk walk across his holdfast in the heavens. "I am. Our daughter will grace us with her presence soon."

"A girl? Bold of you to presume." He smiles. They stop at a gilded door where she can barely hear a dozen voices murmuring in unison. "It seems Gaia did not exaggerate. You truly have a way with children."

Rhea grimaces. "Yes, I suspect this is why Nyx requested me. I hope to live up to her expectations, my lord."

Aether pushes open the doors. "Scatter," he demands.

Like the wind, cloud nymphs zoom past him, fleeing out into the hall save for two gripping a raven-haired goddess by both arms.

Aether averts his eyes, ushering Rhea inside, "The floor is yours, my queen."

The doors shut close behind her before she can speak.

"Good niece." The straining goddess cranes her head. "I would bow to you, but it seems I am already crouched."

She squares her shoulders, letting the piled stress from today's events so far roll off her skin. "Do not strain yourself, Lady Nyx. I'm not a Titaness who cares for such pleasantries." A cloud nymph hands Rhea a wet rag to wipe her hands. "Shall we begin?"

She walks to Nyx's side before the goddess can nod her approval. "The birth has stalled?"

"Yes, my lady," one of the nymphs responds. "She has not progressed for hours."

Nyx manages a twisted smile. "Your presence makes all the difference, young Rhea."

Truthfully, Rhea cannot discern sarcasm from sincerity when it comes to this goddess. Nyx's aura on its own is as mysterious as wide-ranging Chaos, full of equal parts horror and mirth. Not that the Titaness has time to encourage Nyx to divulge her inner thoughts.

In any other circumstance, Rhea would feel ridiculous hiking up the goddess of night's gown to catch a glimpse of what lies beneath. Unfortunately, such thoughts of embarrassment have no place when the state of the world is at stake. "I can see a head crowning, but something is preventing the babe from moving." She lays her hands against the Primordial's stomach. A beat passes before the Titaness purses her lips. "Nyx, do you have twins?"

"Fuck if I know," she snorts. "At this rate, I might as well have birthed the Fates all over again."

Rhea cranes her head. Silver glows at her fingertips. Her eyes alight with new revelations. "Wings—" She draws her hand away. "Nyx, I'll have to—"

"Gods if I give a fuck," the goddess retorts. "Do whatever you need to, Rhea."

She sends a pointed glance at the nymphs. "Have those hands ready." They crowd the floor at Nyx's side.

Rhea takes a deep breath, tunneling her concentration. What follows is a small crack – barely audible over Nyx groaning in relief.

"My lady!" exclaims a nymph, in what Rhea hopes is astonishment at the sight of movement.

She takes Nyx by the hand. "It's all you now."

Pain from subsequent contractions tints the air red. "Breathe," Rhea coaxes in the smoothest voice she can manage, recalling that it had brought Gaia comfort once. In truth, both Nyx and the earth goddess seem of similar stock, hardened from eons of toiling within the void.

"One more," the Titaness whispers. She spares a tepid glance at the windows for any sign of sunlight. "One more and he's free."

Nyx's gaze blackens. In a single fell swoop, Rhea feels the entire room being sucked of all air. Of course, she does not need oxygen to live. Rhea holds her breath anyway.

Say what she will about Nyx, the goddess does not scream or cry out through from her labor. In one instance, she even laughs until Rhea's ears pop from a change in atmosphere. One nymph squeals, "My lady!"

There are no cries to signal the birth of a new god, only the sound of a wet load dropping into anxious hands. The babe switches hands quickly to be cleaned of filth and made presentable for his mother. Though even beneath the stain of ichor Rhea still catches sight of sharp, white wings.

Over their barely hidden whispers she hears, "Is he… sleeping?"

"That's impossible."

Ignoring the nymphs, Rhea manages a smile. "His wing must have gotten caught."

The goddess of night snorts. "On what? My fucking pelvis?"

Rhea doesn't respond as Nyx's breath quickens again; no doubt the next babe ready to make his exit. This time, hopefully, with less trouble. Her irises pale and she nods. "Again," Rhea commands.

Dutifully, Nyx follows her lead – a moment Rhea should cherish for all eternity since it is unlikely to ever happen again. She bears down with one final push. Like a dam bursting, the babe slips out in a mess of ichor. Rhea scrambles to catch him.

Nyx falls to the floor out of exhaustion, sighing, "Sweet Chaos."

The soft wail released from Nyx's second son rings out like a rasping choir of dying men. It lasts only for a moment until his abysmal eyes lock onto Rhea's, leveling at her a deeply unsettling stare. Something tells her not to let this one leave her grasp. Unlike his brother, his wings are nearly as black as his mother's hair.

She holds him at a distance, to also be wiped down of ichor, before shuffling the twins to the collapsed goddess of night.

"Blessings to you, Lady Nyx," the nymphs murmur in unison.

She sneers. "Some blessing. Because of these little bastards I nearly missed my deadline." With more strength than Rhea could muster in a lifetime, Nyx rises to her feet, juggling both infants on either hip. Her dark eyes wander to the windows, finally noticing the first signs of sunlight peeking out from between the clouds. "Thank you, dear Rhea. I won't forget this."

Rhea bows as low as she can. "The honor was mine, my lady."

Nyx sweeps out from the room on shaky legs, robes billowing out like smoke behind her. "May the birth of your child turn out much smoother than mine."

She rests a hand on her own swollen belly and feels a twinge of movement beneath it. _Won't be long now._

* * *

He is in Hyperion's domain when he senses the rip in the universe. A power unrestrained seeping from some unknown crevice. It hits Kronos in his breast and he stops mid-conversation with his brother. "Do you feel that?"

"Feel what?"

The Titan Lord struggles to find the right words. The doors part open before he can make the attempt.

"My lord!"

Theia flutters in, a grown of white silk trimmed with gold flailing behind her like smoke. There are times she shines too bright – when her skin is so pale, her teeth blinding when she smiles, her entire body armed head to toe in shining jewels from different corners of his world – and the Titaness is a nightmare to look at. But Kronos cannot tear his eyes away from her, not as she says, "You must go to Othrys. Rhea—"

She need not even finish. His return is instantaneous.

A smiling Metis awaits him. "This way, my lord," she says, face lit up with a joy he cannot empathize with. She tells Kronos of his wife's state, but he barely hears her.

He can only feel, as he is led along, that nothing is as it should be. The rip in the world is stronger here. The power washes over him, settles him into submission. It is greater than he could ever be, so raw, so untamed. If he lets it, it will destroy him. He knows it will.

They enter Rhea's chambers, where Kronos finds her resting atop their bed, eyes sagged and weary as if Ouranos's sleeping curse has finally gotten the best of her. But it is her grin that makes him breathless, one he has never seen before, so peaceful and so serene.

"Kronos," she whispers, ringing like a gentle sigh. "Come look."

He does not recall telling his body to move. But in the next moment, he finds himself kneeling at her bedside, feeling such love radiating from her soul.

Kronos finds that rip in the universe, nestled between Rhea's arms, suckling from her breast. A golden-flesh daughter so small he can lift her in one hand.

"She is perfect," he says, because it is no lie. She is beautiful and perfect, and… dangerous. She is so dangerous he can hardly breathe.

_You never do listen, do you? _Ouranos's ghost whispers in his ear from some unknown crevice. _I told you: you are doomed to suffer the same fate._

* * *

Her eyes glow like coals on a burning hearth. She smiles up at him and his frown only deepens.

She is no Titan.

He knew it in his heart from the very moment he laid eyes on Hestia, even if Rhea was too blind to notice. He has always known.

Hestia coos, her chubby hands reaching up to touch him. Kronos recoils. She is beautiful, far more beautiful than any Titan babe he's ever had the privilege of meeting. But that is not what disturbs him. Beneath the surface, it stirs— power beyond his wildest beliefs. A potent smell that burns the hairs along his nostrils.

She laughs at his expression, a laugh just like his wife's. Her presence is the same, like a gentle hand stroking away his paranoia.

_Perhaps if she were older, she could succeed._ No, she _would _succeed.

A better part of him would pay no heed and let the girl live out her days with Rhea. He is king of the cosmos and he need not let a woman – his own daughter – frighten him.

But, for the first time in his immortal life, Kronos wants to cry out to the ether, curse the ghost of his vengeful sire. He wants to pound his feet into the earth, cursing his mother too for not warning of such fate. For allowing Hestia to continue on no longer proves to be an option.

Kronos forces a smile. "There, there," he tells Hestia, holding her tighter in his arms.

Still, the girl frowns, sensing a change in him. She knows something is wrong – so very perceptive, just like her mother.

His form ripples and frays. Her eyes widen in terror – a face to haunt him for eternity. Golden tendrils wrap around her, comforting at first, and then constricting, pulling her inwards toward a special kind of oblivion.

Kronos swallows her whole.

His energy comes together, once more forming the solid entity that is flesh. Kronos look at his arms, Hestia nowhere to be found. She's gone, gone, gone, wriggling inside of him like a little worm. Kronos prays she will die and fade away. But Hestia is immortal and his prayers have never once been answered.

A wind whips through his halls, smothering every lit brazier, candle, and hearth. Heavy silence follows and a chill he has not felt for some time. Not since Rhea first graced Mount Othrys with her presence.

Kronos sinks, cradles his face in his hands, unmoving atop his great obsidian throne. His daughter's face brands itself into his memory. _Rhea. _For what he's done to her is beyond forgiveness.

Just thought of her summons her into existence, far sooner than he anticipated.

"Kronos?" says a tepid voice from the shadows, down the hall. Footsteps rush towards him. "Something is wrong. Hestia, where… where is—"


	6. The Pit

Kronos does not see her. Perhaps out of shame. Perhaps Rhea barring her doors to the outside does it. Not that it makes a difference; she would not see him otherwise.

She falls so deep into the dark realms of Erebos lurking within her soul that, for a moment, it seems as if her entire life has been spent here. Any happiness she once felt, like streams of sunlight through a thicket of trees – a dream, a _lie._

(But perhaps her memories tell her otherwise.)

Rhea lets the sobs wrack her body first, day and night for what must be a hundred nights, until every muscle is aching and raw, until her tears have run dry.

Then she shivers. The curtains remain drawn, the braziers unlit, the white skins draped across the bed shoved to the floor. The cold weight of Othrys presses down on her more heavily than it ever did before, this time no spark in her womb to ward her from the chill.

And, of course, silence. The only thing Rhea welcomes as she drifts off into nothingness.

* * *

"Gaia grows insistent."

Kronos gouges his nail into the armrests of his chair. "She was never one for patience."

Koios regards the Titan Lord with a dull, lingering gaze. Noting everything, no doubt: guilt chewing away at his health, giving way to a barely concealed rage and nervous ticks. "She has petitioned Krios before me, as he is often inclined to indulge her."

Kronos fights the urge to pinch the bridge of his nose – yet another thing his brother might be quick to notice. "What rash promises did he make this time?"

"Unsatisfactory ones, apparently, if she sought me out."

He snorts. "And you never give way to her, frigid and calculated as you are."

Koios says nothing to that. He only leans forward and pours himself a glass of nectar. He turns an eyebrow up to Kronos, but he dismisses the offer. His brother takes a sip before speaking again. "She will go to Hyperion next."

"Who will not act on anything without consulting me first." He carves his nail into the chair again. "Then after?"

A muscle twitches beneath his eye. "I fear mother will take matters into her own hands, as she is inclined to do."

Rage pierces through his lungs but Kronos holds it back with gritted teeth. "Not if she wants me to unleash hell upon her."

"You are spread thin from this stalemate with Oceanus," Koios comments simply, though the majority of his thoughts remain unsaid. _Challenge her and she will be victorious. _He sets down his glass. "Perhaps there is a way to placate her." Kronos does not rise to contest, which Koios takes as a sign to continue. "She wishes to see Rhea. Perhaps in the hope your wife will sway your decision."

This time his answer is immediate. "No." His clenched hands seem close to snapping the chair he sits on altogether. "Rhea is fit to see no one."

Koios leans back, arms crossed. "As I know all too well."

_Of course. _The Titan Lord had gone through great lengths to keep news of Hestia's disappearance and Rhea's absence confined to these walls. Even his brothers Kronos had only told them bits and pieces. In turn, he was sure they would divulge such information to their wives in order to temper their meddlesome nature. Though he remains unsurprised that a wily creature like Koios has seen through such a ruse.

"Does Gaia know?" Kronos murmurs, as if the goddess can hear him.

"Unlikely. She is too focused on this crusade." He purses his lips. "There are… rumors, of course. You will only be able to ignore those for so long. No revealing ceremony of the child, no Rhea to be seen. It stokes suspicion."

"I care not for their judgment."

"I know. It is the prophecy that they fear though. That _you _fear."

"The matter with Gaia, Koios," the Titan Lord snaps. "That is what I brought you here to discuss."

He does not flinch. "Why do you resist her?"

Why indeed. In truth, despite her arrogance and brusk demeanor, she had given him everything on the surface: an entire pantheon for him to rule, a beautiful wife, freedom from their oppressive sire. She had only one demand in return. Kronos scowls. "What do I do with them if they are freed, Koios? Will you carve out a part of your own lands to accommodate them?"

Silence, the response he expected to receive. This is a matter he has not considered lightly.

"I know nothing of them, these siblings of mine. They have spent an eternity in the Pit. They may very well be grateful if I free them. Or they may turn on us, having remembered all the times we stood aside and let Tartarus drag them to his abode with father's blessing. It is a risk I am not eager to take. I am sure you would agree?"

His brother only nods, his personal feelings guarded so tightly Kronos has half a mind to throttle him. "Secure the throne then. If mother has not reached him yet, I will advise Hyperion on keeping his refusal as tactful as possible. Of all the issues we face now, mother erupting could very well prove disastrous."

With a bow of his head, Koios stands to leave.

Kronos closes his eyes, sighing, "Thank you, brother." At least Kronos has no reason to question his loyalty. Yet.

His brother pauses at the door. "Phoebe has informed me that Rhea wanders the palace."

He stiffens. _Curses._ "The nymphs told me much of the same."

"I would… fix the issue. _Before _Gaia starts sniffing for weakness."

_It's too late, _Kronos wants to tell his brother as he goes. The Titan Lord has already inflicted these injuries upon himself and the wolves have caught the scent. _I cannot undo this. _

He avoids Rhea still, though continues on with the rest of Koios's schemes. The Titan brothers will stand firm on this decision, while Kronos lies back in the shadows to lick his wounds. But, as Koios suggested, this will do little to shake off their tyrannical mother.

Where Kronos thought he could shut her out of Mount Othrys, she proves too wily to keep out entirely, going as far as to ambush him in his own quarters at knifepoint in the dead of night. "Where is my child?"

The Titan Lord is hardly surprised. "You'll have to be specific, mother."

"Do not play games with me, boy." The blade presses deeper against his throat and the ichor drips. Celestial bronze for certain. "I want my daughter. I want her now."

Just as he had feared. "My _wife_," Kronos retorts, snatching her by the wrist, "is still recovering. The birth was exceptionally hard on her, as the first ones often are. Rhea rests to gather her strength."

She rears back like a spitting cobra. "You lie. It has been too long for such things."

"You're hysterical, mother." He touches his neck, wincing. Ichor stains his fingers. "It would reverse the progress she has made. It is best you go."

"She doesn't know what you're doing here. Keeping your siblings locked in Tartarus. Rhea would never stand for it; would hate you a great deal for it."

_She hates me a great deal already. _"She is resting," Kronos affirms for the last time. "Escort yourself from my palace before I call upon my brothers to do the deed."

"Coward," Gaia spits. The knife sails past Kronos, narrowly missing his head and piercing the wall behind him. "You could hardly face Ouranos together. Should you wish to do me harm as well, it will not be so _easy._"

He glowers at her with half a mind to brandish her own knife against her. "Do not underestimate me, mother."

She sneers. "Only if you extend me the same courtesy."

* * *

When his day explodes into chaos, Kronos knows Gaia is to blame. When the sky turns gray, the sea drowns his lands, and ash rains from the sky, he knows that this is her doing.

Kronos storms into his war council, barely holding onto a shred of sanity. He grabs an empty chair and flings it against the back wall, wood shattering into splinters. He certainly won't be sitting down anytime soon in this mood. "Tell me what the bitch has done."

Hyperion can hardly meet his gaze. "Mount Etna has erupted."

"Plug it."

"We've tried," his brother whispers in what can only be exhaustion and with no success. "Mother is not pleased."

Reasons to fear the Primordials – Gaia above them all – were obvious to them the moment the Titans were born into the world. As symbols of natural forces beyond mortal and immortal control, they prove to be annoyingly permanent and irrevocably powerful. Even Ouranos, having lost all hopes of regaining physical form, still has pieces of consciousness floating around on the wind.

At that reminder, the Titan Lord's mood sours further. "Mother can throw herself into the Chaotic void for all I care if she thinks _this _is the way to mollify me like some terrified maid."

"Kronos," Koios utters calmly. "Do you want my information or not?"

He shoves Krios from his seat and claims it for himself, fists still clenched at his sides. "Tell me then, how much has Gaia's disaster cost us?"

"Nearly the entire mortal population of Etna and nearby areas were decimated from the immediate eruption." Koios pauses for a beat, as if waiting for his king to explode once again. Even Krios stays unmoving on the ground, ready to flee at any sign of throttling. "Lord Aether has reported that the upper reaches of his domain are clouded in ash and do not seem like they will subside soon. It is only a matter of time until we are plunged into a long winter. We will lose many mortals yet."

Iapetus's mouth settles into a thin line. "And with them go their prayers."

His fists pound the table, nearly breaking it in half. His brothers stiffen. Only Koios remains unfazed. "My lord," he continues, "Mount Etna was an important portal to the Underworld. She is a gaping behemoth now."

"There have been reports of monsters and spirits fleeing into this world," adds Iapetus again, quieter this time. Krios remains silent, though Kronos cannot tell if it is out of spite or sheer ignorance.

"I will capture them for you, my lord, if it please you," Hyperion chirps, eager in spirit through his shoulders sag.

"And not the matter that concerns me," Koios retorts. "We cannot close Etna while it still trembles and spews lava."

A growl rumbles low in his chest. "What are you asking me to do?" says Kronos.

"Mother must be placated. I warned you this would happen."

He casts Koios a glare more frigid than the domain his brother rules over. "So you blame me, is that right?"

"No, my lord. Gaia is at fault and she will be dealt with in time. But for now, we must keep her from destroying this realm and the mortal flock we depend on."

"And how do you expect we do this? By going back and giving in on her demands?" Krios butts in, finally. "That will be an embarrassment that Gaia will never let us live down."

He draws in a sharp breath, the only time any of them have ever seen their most level-headed brother at the point of frustration. "Not all of them," the Titan of the North persists. "Only one."

Kronos is the only one who doesn't look confused. "Koios—"

His gaze hardens. "If it will bring Gaia to the bargaining table and allow us to seal Etna, you must let her see R—"

The doors slam open before Koios can finish.

"My lord!" A shaken Theia rushes into the war room, bowing low to the floor upon entry. Her thin shoulders tremble. "I do not mean to be impertinent—"

"Theia!" Her husband hisses. "What is the meaning of this—?"

"Rhea," she interrupts, catching Kronos's eye. "She is beyond my Sight. I cannot see her."

His heart nearly stops. "What do you mean?"

The Titaness stands, clutching her arms tight to her chest. "She has gone from Othrys and I do not know how."

Panic, like a cold bucket of water, douses the flames of Kronos's anger. Gaia can be dealt with later, but his wife… "Prepare a search."

* * *

Her breasts ache, heavier than they have been in the last few days, as she climbs over shattered volcanic rock. The path through Mount Etna straight into the Underworld is sharper than glass, but even the sensation of her feet slicing open fails to override the sensation of the wet spots on the front of her dress, her body continuing to produce milk for a babe that does not exist. And it is certainly not enough to detract her from the cry that has led her here.

Before fields of white flowers appear out of the gloom, she swears it is Hestia's cry that she hears. Terrified, _needing _Rhea – surely what it must have sounded like in her last moments in Kronos's arms. But then it morphs into another cry that she has not heard for many years. A cry that used to haunt her dreams when gods once slept.

"Briares?" Rhea whispers, bloody feet now stepping upon dead grass blanched of all life. Only asphodels stand tall enough to brush against her knees, stretching on for many miles. But if she squints, she can make out a forest of poplar trees barely visible in the gloom.

From the forest, the cry echoes out. Ominous and dreadful.

"Briares?" she says again, running without another thought. Branches slice into her arms. More ichor drips from her flesh, feeding this barren wasteland where death rules supreme.

"Briares!" Rhea screams as his wail grows in intensity, ringing in her ears until she has no thoughts left and she is driven to the verge of madness.

An unknown light tinges the fog green. Gooseflesh rises on her arms and Rhea's pace slows. Her hungry gaze drifts along the trees. "_You._"

Quiet laughter billows out in response. She follows the sound, sneering, "Show yourself, _monster._"

The forest thins and the small voice inside her head bids her to pause. She can see the treeline and knows that if she dares to tread past it, she will be lost for all eternity. "I said _show yourself._"

A flaming hand wraps around her wrist and spins her around.

He is not a monster, no – he is _father _of monsters. And yet Rhea realizes that his gaze alone does not send her to her knees as it once did.

Her tongue twists upon itself as she wrenches his name free. "Tartarus."

Though there is a void where his mouth should be, she can hear the smirk inflected in his horrendous voice – the sound of metal screeching upon a metal. A voice that once struck fear into her soul but no longer. _The queen comes at last._

"Should I have come sooner?"

Though Rhea is loathed to admit it, he is beautiful in a way – in the eyes at least, a scorching liquid silver that could set the whole world aflame. Even his skin, a patchwork of burned flesh akin to charcoal, is unique in its array of otherworldly scars. Begging the question of what exactly _is _Tartarus, how did he come to be?

Questions she fears to know the answers to.

The Primordial chuckles, responding finally. _It was never my decision to make, little one. So much has changed since our last encounter. _Ice water rushes through her veins. _You're suffering, young Rhea, is so potent it spans across lands far and wide. Across all realms. It reminds me of Gaia's own disappointment, yet it is also so much _more.

She rips her hand from his grasp. Rhea does not look to see if her flesh has singed. "You felt it and you didn't come."

His mishappen head tilts, almost playful. _You called out to me when your grief was half-baked. It is in its prime now and I lifted no finger to bring you here._

"Here where you are more powerful," she muses. "Whereas the surface world taxes your physical form."

_Precisely, _he murmurs. _Stupid girl, your mother always called you. She did not realize your potential._

Rhea stiffens. "It was not your voice that called me down here. But theirs. _Briares_."

Tartarus pauses in front of her. For a moment, all she hears is wheezing. Him… laughing. At _her._

He holds his hand out. _Of course. You are the only Titan that has ever felt anything for them besides dread and irrational loathing._

The air shimmers between his twisted fingers.

Rhea gasps. "Briares."

It could be an illusion for all she knows, a trick to induce more memories of hurt, but the babe in Tartarus's grasp is just as remembers him. Swaddled in spare cloth from a repurposed tunic, as helpless as the day he had been taken. He cries, holding out a dozen hands in her direction as if he has also not forgotten.

_I grow bored of their suffering. It does not fill me as it once did. I have increased their torture in the effort to squeeze out every drop I can and yet— _She feels a palpable squeeze in the air and Briares's wail rises until the pressure subsides. _I fear it is not enough. _

Her head tips up in defiance. "And I take it a Gaia renewed with hope has made your visits to her scarce."

Tartarus hums in agreement. _So what will it be, woman? Will you give yourself to me willingly? _The pressure in the air rises again. _Or must I keep _squeezing…

"Yes."

The babe disappears like smoke in his hands. Tartarus takes her into his burning grasp, looks at her with those cold, dead eyes. He licks the yes from her lips. _Swear it to me, _he whispers like a lover. _Swear I can feast on you and I will let them go. _

Rhea levels her own dead stare on him. "I—"

His serpentine hiss stops her short. The ground beneath him shakes, roiling in his rage. Those molten eyes narrow into slits. _It appears, _his voice warps into something barely flesh and bone and his shadowy form flickers, _that your husband is more attentive than Ouranos ever was._

He disappears into fumes of sulfur that leave her choking and sputtering.

"Rhea." Kronos appears out of the gloom. His face pales. "_Rhea._"

The world spins and Rhea finds herself, not standing within the shadewood, but seated on the edge of the Pit itself, hot steam swirling about her feet. As if she were ready to pitch herself in.

Kronos quickly takes her away from the edge, pulling her into a crushing embrace. She hears his trembling heart and has no words.

He cups her face in his hands, thumbs brushing aside dried tracks of tears. Kronos whispers so low that even Rhea isn't quite sure she hears him say, "I'm sorry."

_Has he ever said those words before? _But he says them again, so quiet still that the world remains oblivious. "I'm sorry."

"Let go of me," she whispers back. She blinks, expecting tears, but they have long run dry. "Let me go."

Go, because she sees that look in his eyes, knows that false promises are only a breath away. He will lure her into complacency and Rhea will follow because she has nothing left.

"We can try again," Kronos says, and a sob ripping through her lungs nearly destroys her. "It will be better this time."

Rhea of the wild things, Rhea queen of the cosmos knows it is such a horrible lie. But Rhea, mother of mothers, makes the dangerous mistake of hoping.

He leads her through the Underworld, but Rhea swears she can hear Tartarus laughing just behind her, no matter how far they distance themselves from the dreadful Pit. The whole time Kronos clings to her, as if she'll disappear all over again. Rhea clings to him because she doesn't know what else to do.

At the mouth of Etna, Kronos makes love to her. And nearly half a hundred times he says to her: _I love you. I'm sorry_.

Rhea tells him nothing in return. Only cries when filled with his seed. Her heart so desperately wants to believe him, that he truly does love her more than anything else in this world. But a part of her knows it cannot be true, not when she can feel Hestia's presence doomed to oblivion inside him.

* * *

Pretending becomes second nature for the both of them.

They do not speak of Tartarus or the Underworld, save for the reports Kronos receives on the status of Mouth Etna. The lava flows have stemmed and the entrance to Erebus's domain sealed, though the earthquakes continue as a constant reminder that Gaia still rages.

They make no mention of Rhea's depression or her disappearance. Hestia's name is struck from all records – as if she never existed. And gods does it wear on her heart, but at least Rhea does not burn at Tartarus's hands. At least they can try again, as much as the thought fills her with such hope and such revulsion at the same time.

Their attempts to return to normalcy fail, of course. Whatever lies between her and Kronos now is not the same as before. It could never be the same as before.

With every breath she takes, lies spew forth. Lies to Kronos, mostly, which she has now gotten quite used to.

"Are you alright?" he will ask her in the moments they pass each other in the hall – the only time Rhea sees him, since their attempts to make their visits with each other scarce.

"Fine," she dismisses, plastering her fake smiles despite the revulsion in her gut. Despite weeks of nausea and fatigue, despite the flutters in her belly signaling dread where it once signaled joy. "Just fine."

And as always, Kronos believes her. Not because he wants to, but for his own sanity, he _has _to. And she understands that perfectly well. After all, Rhea tells herself these same lies.

_Everything will be fine, _she forces herself to believe even when her belly swells for a second time. _He promised we could try again. _

Kronos only notices during the first Titan gathering on Mount Othrys following Hestia's birth. A half-year later, the first time they are forced to sit beside one another for more than a few moments at a time.

"You're pregnant," he says simply, his gaze assessing her from head to toe before taking a long sip of nectar. No doubt noticing how round her figure has become.

Rhea remains silent. More than anything, she wants to keep this temporary peace. To acknowledge such words is to acknowledge what happened to Hestia and she need not dive into the abyss once again.

_To be ignorant is to be sane. _

He simply nods, as if given a response anyway. Unlike with their firstborn, he does not make the declaration to the congregation. Does not toast to her in congratulations. In another lie, Rhea tells herself that this means nothing. Her heart knows the truth, though. She cannot stop her eyes from scanning the crowd of her brethren – so boisterous and carefree. A luxury taken from her too soon.

Her gaze snags upon Phoebe at the center, laughing, Theia at her side. Between them, her little daughter Asteria twirls and smiles. Rhea cannot tear her attention away.

Her heart aches and she reaches for another glass of fermented nectar.

"A word, my lord."

Her attention snaps to the end of the table where Koios and Hyperion stand, hands clasped behind their backs.

"If I were wiser, I would think this an ambush." Kronos finishes his goblet. "Speak, brother."

"The fissure on Etna, my lord—"

The Titan Lord grimaces. "You were unsuccessful."

Koios bows his head. "A permanent fix alludes to a job of unspeakable magnitude, Kronos. One we are not equipped to handle."

He sighs, aging a decade in the span of a second. "And no sign of mother?"

Hyperion shakes his head. "We can wait no longer, my king. She is a threat to the realm and she must be dealt with."

"As you dealt with father?" Rhea snorts, too many sips of nectar making her unusually bold. All eyes turn to her. Their silence is her confirmation. In her heart, she knows she should leave. To be upset over these matters is to put a strain on her unborn child. Yet unhappiness has been a constant for most of her days on Othrys, so she remains all the same.

"Gaia is not Ouranos, Hyperion." Kronos continues when it seems that Rhea is here to stay. "Just because we killed a Primordial once does not mean we will be able to do it again."

He sneers. "An act of deception—"

"Hyperion!" Kronos roars, stunning the Titan into silence. The eyes of a few bystanders flicker their way. "You of all people should realize: we _barely _succeeded the first time. She knows what we are capable of. She will sniff out a coup from leagues away."

Their brother struggles to find words, even Koios is not so quick-witted this time. Kronos is right.

"She trusts me."

All eyes turn to her, stunned. "What?" blurts out Hyperion.

"She trusts me," Rhea repeats, forcing her voice to remain steady and even. "If you have a way to incapacitate her, I can do it. If I call on her, she will come."

Koios's eyes pierce her in one stroke, a thousand thoughts seeming to go through his head in a single moment. "Nyx's boy. The ones everyone has been talking about."

"Hypnos," Kronos adds with a grimace.

"Yes," Hyperion says at last, an unusual edge to his voice. "A large enough dose of his magics would do the trick. But only if Rhea can serve as the lure."

"And can you?" Koios's gaze continues to dissect her with razor precision. "Serve?"

She stares at him head-on, unwavering. "Yes." Her eyes flicker to Kronos. "So long as you do not forget what I will sacrifice."

"Never," her husband says in another lie.

Rhea nearly laughs herself into madness.

* * *

The world around her moves slower than it did before. She almost thinks it Kronos's doing, though this is not so precise. She feels trapped on the other side of a mirror, wading through a strange atmosphere where everything seems out of place. The sun through the thicket of trees, the rustling in the underbrush, the wind blowing back her hair. Everything once so normal now… _wrong_.

_Or I'm the one that doesn't belong._

"Rhea." His hand on the side of her neck draw her from her daze. His fingers drift feather-light to the edge of her cloak, cinching it tighter around her shoulders. She only stares at his mouth, waiting for more lies perhaps. "Be careful."

Her grimace deepens. "She won't hurt me."

Kronos only nods, arms falling to his sides.

She glances at the stones lining the entrance to the sanctuary – the only indication that the space she plans to invade is not the same as the one she stands upon now. Once she crosses it, there is no turning back. Rhea looks back to Kronos, only to find that he has gone.

She sighs.

There is a slight tremor in the air when she crosses the threshold, a warning that serves to usually keep others away. Some spaces across this land are the dominion of one being alone, and even the gods are no exception.

The trees thin into a clearing. Rhea can hear a bubbling brook nearby, birds chirping and, despite her churning emotions, she can still find some semblance of peace. There are no altars to Gaia, no temples dedicated to her – only _this_.

Shuttering her eyes, taking a deep breath, she kneels at the center of the clearing.

"Mother." Her fingers caress the grass, pouring out all her worries, her uncertainty into the earth. If this does not summon her, she knows not of what will. "Speak with me, please." Her voice hitches. "I need your guidance."

A wind whips through the field, sending her hair and her dress to flutter.

_Rhea?_

Her throat tightens. The dirt churns before her, collapsing inward like a sinkhole and then outwards, taking the shape of a woman she would recognize anywhere.

The wind stops abruptly, leaving the forest as silent as a grave.

Gaia takes a step forward, hand outstretched as if she isn't quite sure it is actually her. "Oh, dear one. How I've missed you."

Her mother's hand rests on the top of her head. "I've missed you too."

Her lips settle into a firm line. "A lot has happened since last we spoke."

Rhea simply nods, choking back tears. "Gods, mother. You were so right. I didn't know how right you were but I know now." She leans her head against Gaia's skirts, feeling a thousand years younger. "Gods do I know."

"Now is not the time for that, child. Mother is here now." The goddess kneels beside Rhea, enveloping her in an embrace Rhea thought she never would have never longed for until now. "I wanted so much more for you. Anything but the life I was given. Yet here you are, following in my footsteps. But know, my love, where I was alone, you are not."

Rhea pulls away, loathing the pitiful thing she has become. "I am—"

"No. You have me," she croons. "You have me. I raised you to be a fighter and we will fight this together."

Her blank eyes fixate on Gaia's face. "I have something for you."

"What?" Green eyes, so much like her own, scan Rhea's face. But loss has hardened her. She holds out her hands, levitating a white feather in the air between them.

Gaia cranes her head, seeing how the fibers catch the light. Curiously, she raises her fingers to touch it. "I don't—"

The goddess collapses. Rhea catches her before she hits the ground. "I'm sorry," she cries softly.

That is how her brothers find her: clutching a despondent Gaia – finally at rest – with tears streaming down her face, a bed of wilted wildflowers encircling them.

Rhea can barely stomach Hyperion's sickening grin. Nor the wild mirth in Koios's eyes after a plan well-wrought. Though it is Kronos who hurts her most of all, kneeling at Rhea's side and placing a hand at the small of her back.

"You've done well," he tells her and she instantly wishes the heart torn from her chest.

* * *

With the greed of a newborn babe, Rhea nurses her goblet of fermented nectar. She cannot recall how many she has drunk before this – though in truth she cannot recall much of the festivities for tonight. But whether due to the amount of alcohol that has flown past her lips or the pain which she has tried to drown under a drunken stupor, she cannot be sure.

At least Rhea can no longer muster up the energy to pretend. The preparations of this celebration – over their _victory _against Gaia – she had left to Metis in its entirety. She had wanted nothing to do with it. She _still _wants nothing to do with it.

She does not mingle with her sisters. She has long grown tired of their whispers, their half-hearted attempts in supporting her. They are powerless, weak, just like her. Rhea rather not be reminded.

She does not speak with Kronos sitting at her side, has not spoken to him since that day in the grove. In the months before, she always felt the need to keep up the pleasantries, so eager to please. And for what? To sacrifice her soul for the faint hope that the child turning in her womb may not share the same fate as Hestia?

A jab pierces her lower belly. She elects to ignore it, downing her drink and demanding another. If Kronos notices her intake, he says nothing, and for that she is grateful. Though like her pregnancy with Hestia before, he seems rather amenable when she's so close to bursting.

Another jab in her belly – more nectar flows past her lips.

"I propose a salute!" cries Hyperion – the most festive of the partygoers now that the situation of Gaia and Mount Etna has been resolved – jumping upon the nearest table. "A toast to Koios first, whose endless scheming has returned the world to order once again."

He thanks each of his brothers present, Iapetus for his strength and stamina in sealing the entrance to the Underworld, Krios for… doing whatever it is that Krios does.

"And finally, to our gracious lord—" He tilts his goblet in Kronos's direction. "The mightiest of the Titans. Kronos, whose guidance and leadership we would be lost without."

The roof of the hall shakes with their cheers.

_No thanks to Rhea, _she muses bitterly, unmoving in her seat. Her rage rises as black as the night. Even Kronos looks to her, noticing the change in the air between them. _She who has sacrificed everything for this moment of peace_.

Rhea has half a mind to propose her own speech, denounce all these cowards and charlatans, her husband too for everything that has tormented her in the last year. Until another contraction breaks her.

A sudden liquid drips down from between her thighs. She gasps and bolts to her feet. _No, no, no. _"I need to take a walk."

Kronos cranes an eyebrow at her, perhaps noticing her wobbly gait. "Is that wise?"

She fixes on him a seething glare before stepping down from the dais. Rhea shoves her way through the crowd of gathered Titans, some too drunk to notice their queen walking amongst them, shoving her back. She has no energy to be insulted as her hand clutches her swollen belly.

"Rhea?" says a familiar voice. The hands of her sisters reach out to steady her.

"Don't touch me," she snaps in her panic, looking into Theia's knowing eyes, now tilted in sadness. Her voice lowers, yet sounding no less harsh. "Don't."

Rhea flees the dining hall before she can be faced with their disappointment. Her immediate thought, before being inundated by a pulse of alcoholic inebriation, is that she must put as much distance between herself and the celebration as possible. Though Rhea knows not where she goes. With no destination in mind, the dark halls of Othrys swallow her whole, though perhaps this is what she has craved all along.

She stumbles from alcove to alcove, clutching at her contracting belly, a prayer on her lips that he will come sooner rather than later. Rhea keeps moving, time slipping through her fingers, until her knees give out. She huddles towards a nearby brazier.

Pain washes over her. She lifts her dress and her mouth is wrenched open by a silent scream.

An unnatural gust of wind snuffs out the brazier, leaving her in utter darkness.

* * *

He is born silent – much like the twins she had delivered to Nyx a lifetime ago. Calm. As if he knows Rhea does not wish to be discovered. One look into those intelligent, black eyes and she has no doubts.

_He who sees._

They sit together in the shadows of that forgotten corridor, breathing each other in. He seems the polar opposite of Hestia and yet the memory of her washes over Rhea. Though she has tried to forget, those worms have long-buried deep into the carcass of her heart.

At least she does not weep with him in her arms. The silent strength he lends the Titaness will not allow her to devolve into sadness. Rhea holds him tighter.

An eternity seems to pass and no one comes for her

_He who is unseen._

To name him is to curse, as it had cursed her firstborn. But she looks at him and simply knows: His name is Aidoneus and she loves him like no other. Even when this moment is all for naught, destined to come to a brutal end.

Rhea hears a pair of footsteps, so slow they seem to drag. Full of dread, perhaps.

She only shakes her head and ignores the sound. Anything that is not her son's face, the gentle caress of his fingers on her chin, his breathless gasps, is of secondary importance. It is difficult to smile, but she does.

_He has my lips. He has my cheeks._

"Rhea."

She looks up, her smile fading.

_The shape of _his _eyes. _His _nose._

"Let me see," Kronos says voice oddly strained. As if this is as hard for him as it is for her.

She removes Hades from the folds of her himation. Kronos takes him – she can hardly breathe. With Hestia, there had been love in his eyes even beneath the fear. With Hades… she finds nothing. _Nothing_.

Her heart splits in two all over again.

"You promised." Rhea winces at how broken she sounds.

"Did I?" he says, but it is not without mercy. There is pity in his eyes when he stands to look at her one last time before making the trek down the hallway, Hades still in his arms.

It takes a while still for Rhea to sense her son's dark beauty fading from this world.

The deep abyss calls to her again. But Tartarus will not have her this time. _I am _not _my mother. _She will not allow any silver tongue to sway her into complacency again. Not the demon beneath the earth nor the monster lurking in these halls.

Rhea lifts herself up. She smooths out her dress, which she is surprised to see has been spared of ichor stain. The same cannot be said for the himation she swaddled Hades in. But the ichor has not seeped through the other side. She turns it the other way and wraps it around her shoulders.

His lingering scent nearly makes her weep.

Rhea walks. Though it feels strange; her body is nearly finished knitting itself together after the labor she endured, much quicker than the last time. _As if it never happened._

She approaches the front gates of Othrys. A pair of young Titan guards, noticeably tired from their rotation while the rest of their brethren have joined the festivities, greet her. "The babe leaves me ill at ease," she tells them, glad there are no tears to reveal her lie. "I need air."

She feels them studying her, but Rhea knows that her loose-fitting dress and the positioning of her himation hide her lifeless stomach well. "Of course, my lady."

The gates part open before her. Rhea saunters through them and does not spare a glance back.


	7. Seeds

Though Gaia sleeps, Rhea at least expected to feel her mother's presence here, as the Phrygian plains had once been a sacred place. _Their _sacred place. Though Gaia had told her as much: _Once a bird leaves the nest, mother has no reason to stay._

Truthfully, she cannot be sure what causes her to seek Gaia out. Especially after the betrayal she dealt her, a good daughter would have some sense of shame, would stay as far away from her mother's places of worship.

_Maybe I am a child still, _Rhea muses when she passes her old pond, now smaller than the one conserved in her memories or replicated in the sanctuary on Othrys, plagued by one drought or another. Time marches on, she realizes, leaving those who would seek to preserve it in the dust. _Maybe I will always seek comfort returning to my mother's bosom. _

The last time she had come, their abandoned home had been left in disarray – a last reminder of the struggle which took place here. Now nothing remains but cracked mud bricks barely visible through the long grass. Rhea shouldn't have expected anything else. It has been over a hundred years at least.

She sighs, taking a seat beside the ruins. Rhea lies back, her eyes on the sky and mind strangely silent. She doesn't move.

* * *

"Have you ever seen anything more beautiful?"

Rhea turns her head, the frown gracing her lips now a permanent feature. "How did you find me?" Truthfully, she expected to be found eventually, but this feels much too soon.

_Theia_ being the one to come for her, however, most unexpected.

Her sister leans back, blonde hair glimmering gold in the sunlight. "The clearer your mind, the easier it is to see." She tucks a lock behind her ear. "Clear-sight is my specialty, sister."

Rhea only nods. _Perhaps not so surprising after all._ "Did he send you?"

"As if I would ever do his bidding," Theia snorts.

She rolls her eyes in response. "As if he would give you a choice if commanded."

A dark look passes over her face. "Yes, I am very much familiar with my little brother's commands."

"King," the queen corrects with a frown. "He is our king now."

Theia only nods.

Rhea closes her eyes as their conversation lulls into silence. She cannot be sure how long she has spent out here on the plains, but she does not mind returning to such a timeless state. A ruffling in the grass, accompanied by jeweled bangles jingling, suggests that Theia has lain down beside her. Perhaps they are both in need of peace.

Hours pass before Theia speaks again.

"I've always wanted to go east but mother forbade it." Rhea barely opens her eyes to look at her. "She said other, stranger gods resided beyond. That I would not be welcomed."

"I was told much the same," Rhea whispers. "Do not wander too far: north, east, west, south. Stay within your domain."

"And yet we wonder still," Theia murmurs, eyebrows furrowing.

"Can you see beyond our lands?"

"I tried once. I wouldn't dare try again."

Rhea sits up, her face hardening to stone. "I know you've bedded my husband at least once since I've been away." She hears Theia's short intake of breath. "Will you dare to try again?"

Her grimace deepens. "Who told you?"

"No one."

"Then how?"

She shrugs. It is only a vague intuition she cannot quite put into words. "It is as you said: the clearer your mind the easier it is to see."

Theia closes her eyes, trying to keep a sudden rush of tears at bay. "I'm sorry. I never meant to hurt you." "Nor would I wish to take what is yours by right. You are my queen and I have no intentions to usurp you, whatever you might think. It was so stupid of me—"

"Enough. I accept your apology," Rhea interjects, averting her gaze.

Her voice tightens. "So readily? _How_?"

"I know it is something I will never receive from him." He never apologized for Hades, for lying to her. How could she expect one for infidelity?

Her eyes open, still wet and full of guilt. "You're too good. For us, for this world." She wipes her face. "I wish Fate were kinder to you."

Rhea cradles her knees to her chest – a turtle tucking back inside its shell. "I would like to be alone, Theia. If it does not offend."

"Never, little sister." The Titaness stands, a lovely vision decked in white that leaves an ache in Rhea's heart. A shiny object that was fated to catch the attention of the Titan Lord. "He will find you eventually. Even if he does not guess that you have come here, in exchange for… never seeking me out again, I took his eye. I made him a better one – all-seeing. It's only a matter of time."

"As all things are with Kronos," Rhea sighs. "Thank you for the warning."

At Theia's insistence, Rhea knows she should flee. The border separating their lands from the other gods towards the east lies not too far from the plains. With a day at most, she could very well reach it and Kronos would never suspect.

The prospect of starting a new life dangles like forbidden fruit.

She remains, of course. Rhea is a creature of habit, too attached to the familiar. This same flaw leads her to construct a new hut of a home upon the foundations of her old one.

Unlike most of her sisters raised on Othrys, Rhea's youth was no stranger to hard labor. In the growing season, she tilled countless fields with her mother. But when the landscape grew dry and arid, it was Rhea's job to mend their home and keep it standing.

Memories long past, but at least she has gleaned a lesson or two from them once set upon her task. Her skin browns again in laboring under Hyperion's blistering sun, first crafting mud bricks to erect new walls and then weaving thatch for a new roof.

Her hands constantly at work, body never resting, the days fly by without end. She has no thoughts throughout it all – the bliss of setting one's self to such menial tasks – except for one, drifting in along with dozens of sunsets.

_Is he watching me?_

* * *

Rhea isn't sure why she is surprised when that day finally comes.

With the new walls fully raised, the roof nearly constructed in its entirety, Rhea sits upon the grass to contemplate her work. Picking apart the crooked bricks in which her hands slipped, yes, but also admiring other perfections, such as the care in which she wove the thatch to create a waterproof seal for what little rain might come.

Pride swells in her lungs. Perhaps she is not so helpless after all.

A thought quickly banished once she hears a boom from the sky above and a load impacting the ground at dangerous speeds. The wind ruffles the grass like a tidal wave.

Her nostrils flare – the lioness catching onto a most unpleasant scent. It is with dismay that Rhea realizes all she can do now is wait for him to arrive. To contemplate what punishment he may have in store.

She glares when the grass parts before Kronos, a prayer that her fury will pierce him as sharp as any sword. When it does not, Rhea slowly rises to her feet.

"I should have known you would come here." Her husband does not take another step forward and for that she is grateful. "But I did not think to look."

_Of course not_, Rhea snorts. _Another sign that this marriage was doomed from the start._ "I should have never left. But I never had a choice, did I?"

He sighs, aging almost a thousand years in the blink of an eye. "Rhea—"

Her entire body roils with pent-up frustration. "Leave me alone."

His stubborn jaw clenches but Rhea pays no mind. She simply turns away from him, marching back into her home. She does not bother to check if he follows her or has vanished altogether.

Rhea collapses onto a bed of dead flowers. Her first order of business now that Kronos has arrived? To lie there and weep, for her children and the girl she once was.

When Rhea realizes he intends to stay – reminiscent of his courting of her all those years ago – she builds the door next. At least she can slam it in his face and pretend he is back on Othrys.

At least Kronos does not impose. He does not step foot into her home, only creates a campfire just outside for himself when the night descends upon the land. Though his presence still serves as a constant reminder that her time is limited.

No more gentle pacing.

Rhea works from sunrise to sunset. In a matter of days, she patches up any lingering holes in the roof and plucks dead weeds from the floor that have died from lack of light. Going outside no longer remains an option without stumbling into the last person she wants to see, so she wills spare materials into existence: namely, wood and leather to make a bed, wool to spin and dress it.

More work to keep her emotional state at bay. Until… there is no more work left to do.

She glances around, knowing that she has not recreated everything in its entirety. The flowering vines she grew along the walls are missing, as are the colony of birds that once nested in the roof. Details easily remedied, but something else too.

The touches of her mother, her metallic scent. Smudge marks all over the door frame from when Rhea was only knee-high, always covered in dirt. A thousand other remnants lingering in her memories.

Not that it matters. Rhea does not mean to live here, of course. None of this means anything if she has no one to share this home with.

She sits on her bed, the guilt consuming her once more. She hangs her head in her hands and digs her nails into her cheeks. Rhea wants to tear her flesh open, to feel anything but the aches in her heart consuming every thought she has ever had.

For once in the plains of Phrygia, an immortal wishes for the sweet release of death. However futile those prayers.

* * *

He has spent many nights alone.

After Hestia, such has been the way of things. His heart protests, of course, but he meant the words he said when he and Rhea were intertwined, unable to fully comprehend the gravity of his father's curse.

_I don't deserve to be happy. _

A part of him had peered into the future then without realizing. Only misery will ever be his constant companion. It was Fated.

And so, Kronos assumes he will spend this night alone as well, holding onto the futile attempt that he can muster up the strength to bring his wife home. Chaos forbid what his brothers will say if he returns empty-handed. Though many years a king, he still feels more powerless than ever before.

Midnight falls when her door creaks open. A stone lodges in his throat and Kronos wills himself not to turn at the sound, certain that he will scare her off if he does. But his soul is not made of bronze as he would like to think.

Kronos turns his head slightly, catching her figure in his peripheral vision. The shape of her nearly ceases his breathing altogether. Though the glare she gives him is still just as menacing as before.

Yet she walks to his campsite, arms raised to feel the heat of his fire. Kronos cannot take his eyes off her. Though her gaze does not meet his, instead flickering to the wineskin tucked away at his feet. With no words passing between them, he tosses it to her.

Kronos watches as she drinks long and deep. Some men do not allow their wives to partake in the fermented nectar but he is not so cruel as she would like to believe. He cannot think to pass through this life without it nor torture her so by withholding the same release.

Rhea sighs when she decided she has had enough, though does not pass it back to him. He has no doubt she will finish it by the time this night is over.

"You must come home," Kronos says finally. "It does no good to wallow here."

"Is that a command from my king?" she coughs in response from the strength of his drink, a sardonic smirk pulling at the corner of her. "Or the clucking of a mother hen?"

"Rhea."

She only rolls her eyes and takes another swig. Once again, the stone in his throat silences him, both the Fates and his wife testing his resolve.

"That day I left with you," Rhea retorts this time in no effort to hide her loathing, "it was the worst mistake of my life."

The eviscerating words form another scar he will have to wear for eternity. His ego has long grown used to these attacks. "It's a choice too late to take back."

"A choice you forced me to make."

"I did not," he denies, naturally, arrogant being that he is.

"Yes, you did." Her nails dig into the wineskin and for a moment Kronos think Rhea will pierce it in her anger (which she will no doubt blame him for). "The day you brokered your deal with Gaia, they day you killed Ouranos, you proclaimed my Fate sealed. You never gave me any other choice."

"Your Fate was sealed the moment Ouranos's seed rooted itself within Gaia to create you." His voice cools to a frightening degree. "Our Fate was sealed from the very first breaths we took. Only a fool would think otherwise."

"A fool?" Rhea lets out a grating chuckle. "The bigger fool is one who only picks and chooses which part of a prophecy to follow. Did you think you were immune to Ouranos's curse? We have not slept in _decades_. Our father was many things but not a liar."

Something ravenous within him awakens at the mention of his father, as it always does. "If you think I would have let his words come between us then you are sorely mistaken, Rhea."

Perhaps she sees the hungry look in his eyes, so eager for self-preservation, that she withdraws. "You're the most selfish immortal to have ever graced my presence."

Rhea crosses her arms over her chest, as if guarding her already bruised heart. "Sometimes I think if I had just let you ravage me that day after you killed him – even covered in his godsforsaken ichor – then that would have been enough to quench your thirst. Instead, I traded temporary pain for a lifetime of it."

"You would've wanted that?" His lips curls back into a sneer. "For me to have fucked you and then left you, is that it? Then only to return as my seed bore fruit?"

"I don't see why not," Rhea bites back. "The end result would be the same: a childless Titaness alone in the wilds with her grief."

"No," Kronos dismisses, "because you are returning home with me tonight."

"Over my rotting corpse." Another drink passes past her lips. "You would do best to fool another girl in my place."

"What is done, is done." Truly, he hadn't wanted it to go this way, but Rhea leaves him with no other choice. She has chosen _force_ it seems. "You are my wife, a _queen_, and you belong on Othrys now. Not here in this backwater."

"Backwater," she scoffs. Her eyes burn like flames from the Underworld. "Is that what entranced you to me? You saw the one Titaness they had failed to groom into proper lady – a _wild beast_. And you thought you could tame her, no?"

"Rhea."

"Don't," she sneers, having grown tired of that way he says her name with such exasperation, like a thing to be coddled and reared. Though a mood she soon forgets when she feels his hand pressing firmly against her wrist.

Rhea finds her voice again, but it is remarkably soft this time. "Don't," she repeats

"You will come home with me," Kronos affirms and, though he still remains seated, she feels trapped all the same. And for good reason.

He doesn't give her the chance to deny him again, pulling her further into his embrace, his lips pressed against hers. He encircles her waist with his free hand and Rhea doesn't draw away like she knows she should.

She pours all her anger into the searing kiss. Every scream, every tear, she has ever had to endure for his sake. _Why can't he see? And if he sees, how can he just let it be?_

Rhea only pulls away when his nails grind into her ass. Her hand cracks against his face and, by all the gods both old and new, it feels better than sex, better than whatever inferno is brewing between them. She wants to hit him again – to feel powerful _just this once _– but he seizes her wrist once more.

And kisses her hand.

_No._

Rhea lunges at him. Kronos falls back into the dirt, his wife on top of him with a growl evil enough to give Chaos pause.

"I don't love you," she spits. "I never have."

"Alright," he says simply, his clothed erection twitching on the inside of her thigh. Her hand whips him across the face again but Kronos only smirks in response. "I deserve that."

"This is what you want, isn't it?" she hisses, incredulous but also still so full of rage, so full of lust. Rhea hates him, she does, but she has no idea why it makes her lift his tunic and straddle him harder.

"Rhea," he groans as she tortures him. Rhea can't make him beg for his life but she thinks this is close enough – begging for _her_, so warm, so wet beneath her shift.

But he _loves it _and all she can think is that _it's not fair. _Rhea hikes up her skirt and wastes no time impaling herself. Be what may, she cannot help but admit that she enjoys the feel of him straining inside of her. She forces herself to smother those resulting moans with all her might.

They fix each other with dark gazes.

A growl from Kronos and he seizes her thighs in his hands. Slapping flesh echoes across the grasslands as he takes her – and she takes him – brutally, without mercy. A new experience for them, but one long expected. The era of gentle caresses has long passed.

Rhea can no longer keep silent. She cries out, realizing she has not done so for quite some time now.

Her hand wraps around his throat to steady herself, but also to dig her nails into his flesh. Though it is her mistake to assume this to be a punishment. Kronos enjoys such a thing far too much and it sends him into climax.

She gasps – not from pleasure, but from shock. Rhea rips herself away at last but knows it is too late. His seed drips down the inside of her thighs. With dismay, she thinks, _Consider my fate sealed once again. _

For a moment she stares into those gilded eyes – shame mixed with typical male arrogance. Her pulse quickens and the rage seeps into her bones once more. Rhea spins around and charges into the swaying grass.

"Where are you going?" he calls after her.

She refuses to look back on him. "To rid myself of your stench in the pond!"

Rhea shoves the stalks aside. To her relief, she hears no footsteps behind her signaling he intends to follow. At least sex has proven to reduce him into a simple-minded oaf.

Glancing over her shoulder, seeing no sign of him, she rushes off into the grasslands. The longer her headstart before Kronos notices, the better.

* * *

When Rhea finds them, they are not as she expected.

They bleed red.

It is on her hands when she gifts the sobbing mother her wailing newborn. But she does not sob as Rhea has sobbed; this is joy, not fear.

And the Titaness cannot bear to stare at them for longer than a moment. Silently, she stands. She leaves the mudbrick hut, a little nod at the father pacing outside.

"Thank you," he blurts out in his crude language before rushing to see his wife and child.

Rhea makes the blood from her hands disappear. And Rhea, too, disappears.

The cycle continues over and over again, one home to the next, one human village to the next. It keeps her mind busy even as her own belly swells, stricken with child once more.

Sometimes, depending on their hospitality, she will bless the families with a good harvest to sustain their new children. Sometimes she'll have the wildflowers bloom at the edge of their tiny hobbles, draw in the tamest wolves to protect their homes, lift a fever or two when given the chance.

_Earth Mother_, they call her. She does not have the strength to tell them that the goddess they are really looking for – Gaia – has long been put to rest. All the same, they thank her, still in the crude language of theirs, looking to her with such reverence she almost isn't sure what to do with it. To Rhea, it is a feeling like no other.

For once, she is content, though knows it is not meant to last. Soon, her belly grows too heavy for her to bear.

Rhea finds herself walking their northernmost territory, half a mind to pass the invisible line separating their lands from the _others_ to see what sort of god comes to strike her down. Though she cannot so much as a tiptoe the border before her entire body goes rigid and screams at how wrong this foreign dirt feels beneath her feet.

And so, she turns away, setting her sight upon the great northern fortress seated at the slopes of Mount Rhodopon.

She is half-frozen by the time she reaches Koios's fortress with a belly close to bursting. To no one's surprise, Rhea passes through unchallenged. The ice giants guarding the entrance scramble to bow to her without so much as a word uttered.

Phoebe is whom she finds seated upon her husband's throne of ice, a cape of white fur hanging off her neck and smothering a blue shift beneath.

"My lady," Rhea mocks with a bow of her own.

"My queen. I have been expecting you," Phoebe greets with no such derision. "You have traveled far, though it is with great apology that my husband is not here to welcome you."

It made no difference, truly, whom she would find seated upon this throne. All her subjects are forced to welcome her should they incur Kronos's wrath, runaway wife or otherwise.

Rhea's careful eyes trace the outline of a knife hidden beneath her sister's shift. "I have not come here in search of your husband, Phoebe."

"As I feared," she sighs. "I would never turn you away, Rhea. But if—" her eyes linger upon Rhea's swollen belly "—_when_ your husband comes for you, I will not be able to stop him. I cannot give you the refuge you desire. Certainly not the one you deserve."

It comes as no surprise then, that every Titan must know of her curse by now. "I understand well enough." She holds out her arm. "Come, my journey has been a long one and taxing for sure. Rest would do me nicely and I would enjoy your company."

* * *

"I have a proposition," Rhea tells her sister when her water has broken and Phoebe has sent raven-haired Asteria fleeing from the room in search of midwives.

The Titaness turns from the windows showcasing the newly snowed landscape. Though they both know that not even a hundred snowstorms will keep out their husbands for long. "I cannot, Rhea."

Her eyebrows furrow. "You don't even know what I'm going to say—"

"I do," Phoebe interjects, eyes clouded with a sadness Rhea cannot place. "You have missed much since your return to Phrygia."

Rhea pauses, almost unsure of how to proceed until another contraction spurns her to action again. She grits her teeth. "If this is about Theia's affair with Kronos, I already know. I don't care."

"No. That's not—" Phoebe rubs a finger over the worry lines on her forehead. "I cannot disobey my husband. Not after what Gaia did."

Her mind whirls, enough to distract from her sparse contractions. "Gaia is asleep, I saw with my own eyes. She is harmless—"

"The oracle," Phoebe interjects.

_Ah, _a variable that has slipped Rhea's thoughts until now. The vengeful remnant of Chaos with a mind of its own, it seems.

Her sister crosses the room, taking the seat at her bedside. "Kronos needed it transferred so she was taken to Delphi in her state with Hypnos in toe," Phoebe continues with lips pursed. "Everyone wanted it to pass onto Koios. Themis performed the ceremony to ensure this…" her voice trails off.

"But something went wrong?" Rhea prompts.

Her eyes shut for the briefest of moments. "Gaia awoke."

Ice water rushes through her veins. "Is she still—"

"No. They were able to quell her again." To that, Rhea cannot tell if she is disappointed or relieved. In this state, she is not ready to face Gaia just yet. "But the spirit of the oracle was transferred. Into me."

Rhea has no need to ask _why. _Koios, as one of Kronos's most loyal brothers, had concocted the scheme to put Gaia to sleep after denying her the justice of freeing her other children. If anyone knows how to plot revenge in a split moment of clarity, it is her.

"Did he hurt you?" Rhea asks, rubbing smooth circles onto her belly.

"No," Phoebe dismisses too quickly for Rhea's liking. "Nothing like that."

She quiets again, contemplating. "If you possess the oracle then it means you are more powerful than them both." Her tone nearly sounds envious. Of course, Rhea wonders what might have happened had she been present at Delphi. Had the spirit of the oracle passed to _her _instead. "It doesn't seem like much of a dilemma."

Phoebe almost laughs. "Even if that were true, you can't escape him, sister." Her gaze drifts to Rhea's belly once more and the babe soon to arrive. Sure enough to slow her down. "Not while our brothers rule these lands."

"Then I'll go to another," she retorts.

Phoebe stiffens. "The barrier is too far."

"I can make it. But we have to act quickly once she comes." She endures another contraction. "It won't be long until he senses her power."

"Rhea—"

"I'm only asking you to try," Rhea interjects, knowing she should persist no longer. Knowing that if she widens her eyes just enough, assumes an even more pitiful appearance, her sister will eat out of the palm of her hand. A good sister would never do such a thing. But there is too much at stake. "For me?"

As predicted, Phoebe relents. "I'll see what preparations I can make."

For several hours, her sister disappears. Rhea's mind has no time to think of all the ways in which Phoebe has betrayed her – not while her child forces its way from between her thighs. She grips onto Asteria for support, thankful, at least, that someone is here for company.

The moment Asteria presents Rhea with her new babe, the doors part.

Phoebe arrives alone, skittering like a nervous horse. "Rhea—"

"Is it done?" she murmurs, looking down at the crying daughter that shares her eyes. _Gaia's _eyes. _Perhaps she is with me still. _"Mother loves you little one." _Demeter, my girl. _

Phoebe peers down at her, stroking a finger along the babe's arm. "I sent the servants away. No rumors will spread for the moment."

She only nods, momentarily silenced by the serenity of this moment. It is easy to pretend that there is no vengeful husband hovering over her, that her daughter's birth is a sign that happiness can return to her life once again.

"He will come soon regardless," her sister prompts once again and the illusion shatters "But there is a back gate…"

Rhea struggles off her bed, Phoebe's arm to steady her. "We must go now."

"Are you sure about this?"

"I have no choice."

* * *

Escaping the maze of snowfields seems much more difficult than entering it in the first place, as Rhea walks the same stretches of forest near their northern border. Even with one of her sister's borrowed parkas around her shoulders now, a frigid Rhea feels just as ill-prepared.

They pick their way through tangles of frozen thicket, the added pressure of keeping Demeter from jostling too much in her arms slowing her down even more.

For the hundredth time, Phoebe only watches with a thinly veiled measure of hopelessness, holding out her hand to Rhea. "I could hold her for you," she says after a time.

"No," the queen says too readily. "It's fine, I…"

"I understand."

_How could you? You see your children every day, have never had to wonder at what moment your husband will come to take them away. _She clutches her daughter tighter.

A blue comet flashes across the sky, stopping Phoebe dead in her tracks. Rhea only senses a slight ruffle on the wind, a minor detail usually beneath her notice.

"Koios," her sister whispers. "We won't get far."

Rhea grips her sister by the arm, jostling her. "I just need you to get me to the border, Phoebe. _Please._"

She opens her mouth to speak, but a howl rips through the still air, harsher than any blizzard to grace these lands. "_PHOEBE_!"

Their blood runs as cold as the snow beneath their feet.

"I cannot disobey my husband and my king, Rhea." Phoebe rips her arm away. "I put my own children in danger to help you. This must be as far as I go."

She bares her teeth. "Then you are no sister of mine," Rhea says, charging off into the forest.

"Rhea, please!"

With no one to help her now, she stumbles. Her dress and the flesh on her legs catch on thorns. Drops of ichor spill in her wake, a sure give away to her pursuers. Such chase is not audible. She hears no thunderous pursuit behind her, but Rhea knows this is not Koios's way. He reminds her of a fox, silent in its deception.

The tingle of the barrier calls to her. Where there had once been apprehension, she now senses salvation. If Rhea can slip through the break in the trees just before her muster up the courage she didn't have before—

The snow beneath her turns to ice and she stumbles with only enough balance to shove Demeter into her chest.

"That's enough, sister," says Koios just behind her. "It's over."

She glances over her shoulder, nearly crying when she sees Phoebe's neck clutched in his grasp, frost biting at her pale skin and climbing higher.

Kronos stands beside them. Rhea can say nothing to him, only hold shield her screaming daughter from his scrutiny. "Take her back where it's warm," he orders.

Koios releases Phoebe and she steals a shuddering breath. Her only consolation, if Rhea can even be afforded one at all, is that at least Demeter will never be subjected to the whims of _men_.

Even so, when her callous brother approaches, she can't help but scream, "Don't touch her!" Not that Koios pays any mind to her demands, snatching up the babe regardless.

Demeter passes into her husband's arms and her heart seizes in her chest. "Kronos, please. _Please. _She's only a girl – a stupid little girl." A lie, of course. Especially if she shares more with Rhea then just her eyes.

Her pleas fall on deaf ears. Nor does he look at Rhea; he only has eyes for his child. "I want my wife in Othrys by the end of the day."

"Of course, my lord." Koios nods, as Rhea struggles against him. He throws her into Phoebe's waiting arms and gestures at them to leave.

"That's enough, Rhea," Phoebe croons, throwing a mantle around her sister's shoulders. "Please, walk with me. Please."

"I can't, I can't." Her strength vanishes, resting solely with Demeter now. Her knees seem on the verge of collapse. "My girl. My little girl."

In that moment she understands why mothers often wish for a daughter of their own: a chance of redemption, to raise her _right. _But Rhea has once again been deprived of the chance, forever stuck with her mistakes and at no chance to undo them.

* * *

The abyss beckons again and Rhea knows she must decide here and now before night falls: wallow in pity once more or put herself to work. The choice is simple.

At twilight, guards enter her rooms to begin the escort back to Mount Othrys. All they find is the stone-faced Phoebe sitting at the edge of the bed, her gaze towards the open window. Rhea is nowhere to be found, once again gone with the wind.


End file.
